


Deer to Me

by orphan_account



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Angst, Betrayal, Cute, Explicit Sexual Content, Fluff, Friendship, Hell Hounds, Hurt, M/M, Psychology, Romance, Sadness, doing the do, fragile mind, friendship to romance
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-10-07
Updated: 2013-11-01
Packaged: 2017-12-28 18:28:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 34,637
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/995116
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>a/u. Castiel Novak had seen people he loved disappear all around him, death followed him and stabbed him in the back every chance he got. When Castiel sought out  psychiatric help from someone new he got answers he didn't bargain for from his therapist and his younger brother, Dean Winchester. A story of a young man becoming more than he was ever destined to be and how he took Dean along for the ride. </p><p>Destiel, rated M for later chapters and for mega awesome :))?/ not for kids. 98% chance of you combusting if u read this.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. In which we can plainly see Castiel isn't feeling too well

Castiel Novak sat wearily, fidgeting on the misleading couch, hands forced upon he's knees. He'd seen it, and presuming it would be nice and squashy he'd sat down too heavily, causing a sore butt for about a minute or two. It wasn't very comfortable, a hard sofa in such an artificial situation, clinical even. At least it looked nice, all brown leather and mahogany, pleasing to the eyes and the touch, Castiel stroking the arm nervously, running his fingers along. He messed with his hands, his dark tousled hair, smoothing it and carding his hands through it simultaneously wishing he'd had the forethought to bring something to read, papers or something to keep his dancing mind occupied and away from what was to come. He had some in the car that he needed to go over but he didn't want to move for fear of being absent when his name was called to enter the room. A new room. He was too nervous to remember before he left, hands shaking as he put his keys into the car ignition, tacky key chains hitting the interior, barely able to start it at one point, looking at himself in the reflection of the window and telling himself he needed to calm down, a reminder that he'd been there before many times and it was always fine. It had become some solid ritual for him to console himself in his car.

He was always nervous when he visited the psychiatrist though. He'd come straight from the university after a lecture that lasted too long and slowly drove him insane, and all he really wanted was to go home and curl up in bed, not even bothering to change into pajamas; just falling into the cool sheets as soon as he arrived home. Home was nice. Home was safe. There was nobody there to annoy him or listen to him rant. He slept alone and needed no armor, spoke alone and needed no curious ears to listen. He was lonely and it was perfect.

He'd been coming to the 'Serenity' clinic for just under a year, twice a week, but he'd always been downstairs, never up the twisted staircase until today. Castiel had been transferred.

He added all the sessions up in his head...eighty two. Castiel couldn't afford it really, not on his crappy wage from waiting tables, where he was rarely tipped after forgetting to smile at customers. He thought he'd be finished with it by now. He was told he'd only need to go there for three months, just to get everything off his chest and see if he still needed to take medication, but as he began to tell his story he felt the urgent need to end it for his own sake, for peace of mind and to try to tie a bow at the end of the plot, cut off the blood supply to his dysfunctional brain and let it hum at a slower pace.

He remembered the first time he ever came to the clinic. He felt so much younger back then, as if therapy, just someone listening and occasionally nodding could age a person five years in a time span of less than one. He could blame the stress of school or his job but he knew that the longer he revelled in his thoughts then the older and more cynical he would become, a gradual descent into a person he didn't think he wanted to be. He liked the dark innocence he carried behind him and the heavy shadows that he sighed, clouds that drifted around him.

He remembered arriving about two hours too early on his first day, an ever-present rush, always wanting to be too early rather than too late, just sitting and watching as he quietly bode his time. He saw people go in and come back out afterwards, they came out with some looking glad to be rid of anything they once possessed and other with blotchy faces and teary eyes, clutching tissues and dabbing their noses. Some taking ten minutes and some taking more, a lot more. They all had a slightly insane look about them though. When Castiel looked in the mirror he didn't see insanity staring back at him. Maybe just a puzzled expression.

The waiting room downstairs was the almost exactly the same as it had been a year ago, with the exception of a new bookcase but no new books. The foyer and adjoining waiting room was all stark whites and pastel blues, a small fountain in the middle with water dyed dark blue, spurting half heartedly every couple of seconds. It wheezed occasionally. Cas could relate to that fountain, a nice exterior with an inside that was giving up but still sort of trying. Castiel was always trying and he would always be trying to try until he was destined to die. It was all he could do.

The room was meant to be relaxing but it always made him feel like he was in a hospital, like he was sick. At least the sofa down their was comfortable. He fished out a memory of being called in on his first day, greeted by a woman with red hair. She was beautiful Cas thought as she motioned for him to sit opposite her, all long hair and doe eyes in a smart shirt and skirt. She reassured him that it was okay, just with one smile and he told her all he could that day. After some gentle coaxing he told her a lot more too. He told her things he didn't even know that he knew, deep rooted things that he had forgotten about. He told her about his childhood, growing up, and now, the present. She asked about the future but that was the only thing Castiel couldn't talk about. He didn't want to guess at what it all held, he wanted to believe that somebody, maybe God, would make it all okay for him and write a nice ending for him. In the future though, he thought he might be dead and buried before his story could conclude.

Ten minutes ago he'd traced his fingers along the mahogany banister of the spiral staircase, lingering with his touch, wary of the waiting room. All for show he presumed, making the patients feel they were in a safe, professional environment, somewhere they could call home and not a place to proclaim their insanity. For at least ten minutes nobody had come up, or gone down those stairs and it worried him, imagining some kind of odd torture room were patients were assessed and disposed of if they weren't a quick fix case. This waiting room too had an underlying medical feel to it, walls cream instead of white, the artificial facade hidden by soft touches of wood and leather like an upper class hunting cabin. He expected their to be various stuffed animals dotted around, whether staring from the wall with glassy eyes, mounted on wood, or positioned on pieces or bark and popped on mantle pieces. Castiel had an odd fascination with taxidermy. 'It used to worry my mother.' he'd revealed to Anna one time. 'Why?' she'd replied. 'Because they're dead, children shouldn't play with dead things.'

He pushed his glasses up his nose, tortoiseshell frames that didn't really suit his soft, gentle face, making his eyes look smaller than they actually were, the glare disguising the dark, long lashes that outlined his eyes and made him look so pretty, but he needed them to see. He scanned the selection of magazines on the table, mainly women's titles, one on classic cars. He chose the latter. He didn't want to succumb to stereotypes. He couldn't really get into it, cars were just a mode of transport, getting you from A to B in comfort, nothing truly beautiful about that but some of these people, it seemed they were actually in love with their shiny hunks of metal, fawning over them like they were new born babies, devoting their lives to keep them in good condition and make sure they glistened. He could appreciate old cars but it didn't mean he'd ever take it up as a hobby. Castiel preferred trains anyway, choosing the sounds of gentle whirring on the tracks and the lovely silence from other passengers, as opposed to the roar of engines and the smell of gasoline and leaky engines. It's nice to love something though he thought to himself. Some of the cars were nice and loved, really cared for.

'Bet these guys can't get laid.' he muttered, the cynic in him released, flicking through the flimsy glossed paper pages, eyes landing on an article about the importance of gear sticks instead of automatic. Swapping to a question page. 'Please help, my wife wont have sex with me because I spend too much time wanking over my vintage Vespa.' Cas mocked, pulling a face. 'I'm addicted to car porn.'

'See you Sammy.'

Castiel looked up quickly, pushing up the glasses that had again slid down the bridge of his nose. He really should get them adjusted so they didn't fall halfway down his face every time he looked down, it was quite a nuisance.

It confirmed that his theory about torturing wasn't true. There was a survivor- a good looking one Cas noted. He watched as the man left the only room on the upper floor, clumsily waving at the man inside and closing the door so Cas couldn't get a proper look at what was inside. He looked over at Castiel and nodded. 'Good choice.' he commented, flicking his line of sight to the magazine. He had nice eyes Cas thought, green that reminded him of grass in the morning, soaked with dew and tiny spider webs, the promise of a wonderful morning and the prospect of a better day.

'It was this or Vogue.' Castiel shrugged, smirking and trying to be charming, sifting through the pages again, deftly attempting to make it look like his heart wasn't beating as fast as it actually was. He didn't believe in love at first sight, But he did believe in lust at first sight and he wanted to...do things. Unspeakable things that made a slight blush creep across his pale cheeks. He hoped the guy wouldn't notice, but he already had. Dean thought it was unbelievably sweet.

Dean smiled slightly in return, seemingly hesitating for a moment before speaking, clearing his throat before he did so. 'I have a classic myself, a Chevy Impala 67, she's my baby.' He had a nice voice, deep and authoritative Castiel thought. He liked that in a man. 'She purrs, runs like a dream too.' He stopped talking and smiled lightly 'You probably don't care, that's fine.'

Castiel tilted his head. He had no idea what car he was talking about but he was interested. Anything this guy had to say was interesting. He realised that Dean was one of the guys he'd just been mocking. It didn't make sense though...he was attractive, he could get laid easily by anybody he desired, not like most of the guys in the magazine who posed proudly by their restored vehicles.

He's compensating for something Cas thought, he's got a tiny cock, or daddy issues or he just really likes classic cars. Castiel hated himself for always being such a presumptuous person. It was such a habit to try and analyse people and think horrible things about them. He deserved them saying horrible things about him. But they didn't. Nobody really ever had a bad word to say about Cas except for that he worried to much and over thought everything. He blamed his childhood, his reckless brothers that showing him with police car rides home and hour long detentions after school that sometimes it was better to think rather than to just go for it. So he thought a lot. A blessing and a burden.

Dean smiled again and turned his back to Castiel, walking to the faux wooden water fountain positioned on the back wall, bending over to grab a cup and have a drink. It seemed out of place, water was meant to be downstairs beside the leaky fountain, upstairs it was only supposed to be wood and glaze.

Castiel lowered his gaze. He was comfortable with staring at this guys behind, jeans straining slightly as he bent, perfectly outlined in all the right places. He wanted to reach out and realised how inappropriate he was acting right now. 'Keep your dirty thoughts to yourself' he scolded himself, almost physically slapping himself on the wrist. He did it mentally instead.

He would often find great pleasure in checking guys out, and this one was just pure gold dust to the eyes. He was taller than Cas was, only by a couple of inches, and decidedly more muscular, as Castiel liked his men to be.

Castiel always wanted to be the one who needed looking after in a relationship, the doting boyfriend that spoke wise words and proverbs and patched up their lover after they'd got into fights, kissing bandages as they went. That was all he ever needed-to be needed by someone as much as he needed them. He liked to be the little spoon, he liked to be on the bottom, he liked to be told what to do and never have to make his own decisions. Some people do. He wanted to be cared for and cuddled and mean something to someone. He wanted to be dominated and caressed and kissed all over by someone who knew him more than he knew himself. He wanted a little bit too much.

Dean had an angular face with tanned skin and a light stubble, a face that could be admired and labelled pretty as well as handsome, more handsome though...the word Cas would use would be rugged and slightly weather beaten. Cas wanted to trace his fingers over Dean's cheekbones, he wanted to grab his face and kiss his pretty pink lips.

He's not gay Cas reminded himself. It didn't matter, didn't mean he couldn't dream about it or think about him. There was nothing wrong with imagining running his hands over the familiar molded leather and taking off his jacket and dark plaid shirt, getting to the t shirt underneath, stroking his hands over his hard chest and around his back, all the way down. Castiel blinked back for a moment, not quite believing how he was acting. He'd never done that before. Not in public anyway.

He felt disheveled in comparison to Dean, his hair a mess from having run his hands through it in the car as he gave himself a pep talk, his face unshaven, eyes tired and heavy. He discreetly smoothed down his outfit of tight-ish blue jeans and forest green sweater thrown over a checked shirt. He was still in his school clothes. School clothes were everyday clothes too but he liked to refer to them as school clothes. At home he just wore sweats and t shirts.

'Mr. Novak?'

Castiel looked up to see the door had again been opened, this time by a tall man in an expensive looking dark suit with what could only be referred to as a mane of brown hair. It looked like he brushed it every couple of minutes but Castiel liked the way it flopped forward onto his face and curled faintly behind.. He looked nice, Cas thought in a totally non sexual way. He just looked nice. He thought it odd that he could see two equally attractive men and only think one of them as being what he wanted.

He got up slowly, putting down the magazine that he hadn't even been reading for a while now, discarded after the arrival of him, and walked to the door, feeling it close closely behind him, leaving Dean alone in the waiting room.

'Please sit.' Sam Winchester said calmly, gesturing at the large leather chair that sat opposite its counterpart, a glass table separating the two, on which sat a glass of water and some tissues. Castiel wondered if he'd cry. Not today but in the future. He did once with Anna, crying because he didn't think it was fair that he left him, that Cas met new people all the time and didn't fall in love with them the way his boyfriend did. He always saw people he would definitely rather be with, he didn't fall in love with them though because he was loyal to the people he loved.

Castiel sat, taking time to admire the room. Two bookcases took up the whole of one wall, huge wooden things, intricately carved around the corners with leaves and branches. It was something he'd like to own, but he knew he didn't have enough books to fill it, barely enough to fill it halfway, even if he included the fat textbooks he needed for school that overflowed with words in a font size way to small for his liking, making him take of his glasses to see them properly. The joys of being short sighted. Castiel read a lot, letting it take away his spare time and him altogether. He consumed books in the same way that they consumed him. He relished in the feeling he got after finishing a book; relief and reget. The cases were filled with ancient leather bounds with odd titles like 'Daeva' and 'Buruburu'. He had no idea what anything meant until his eyes skimmed titles like '1984' and 'To Kill a Mockingbird'-titles he was familiar with. A sunburst clock sat on one wall, ticking away quietly but still annoyingly, a stag head resting opposite, its glassy black eyes curious. He liked that. There was the mounted head he'd missed in the waiting area. He knew there'd be one somewhere. Maybe it had been killed by his therapist himself.

Sam spoke. 'Sorry we had to transfer you, it's just that we believe I'm more suited to your...' he stopped, looking for the right word 'disposition.' Sam looked at the ceiling for a moment then back to Cas, a look that made Cas feel like he was strapped to an operating table and numbed, listening to the doctors as he slipped out of consciousness , the surgeons trying to decide what actually needed to to taken out or replaced. He was purely professional and analytical, but he was reassuring too.

Castiel shrugged. 'So what, do you have my case notes or do I have to tell you my life story like i've been doing with Anna for the past year?' He said it with a poison that he didn't mean to be there, it just felt like a year had been wasted, money had been wasted. He could have used that to take a vacation somewhere, maybe on his own, maybe with someone. He'd been wanting to go for a long time now but scraping together the money was hard, unexpected bills coming through the door and washing machines and dryers that always seemed to break when he had enough saved up for a couple of days away. it wasn't Sam's fault. it was his own for being the way he was.

'I know about you, but I want you to tell me about yourself.' Sam said, leaning forward and resting his elbows on his knees, hands clasped together. 'How old are you Castiel?' He looked at Cas from slightly underneath his lashes. He looked sincere and he seemed nice but Castiel didn't know whether to trust him. His intuition said yes but it always seemed to be wrong nowadays.

'I'm twenty one.' Cas relied, not really sure why it mattered. He clawed his fingers into the leather clad arm of the chair and he turned around as he began to hear the patter of rain on the windows outside. He was trying to remember if he'd left his car window open or not. He didn't think he had but the doubt bit away at him.

'You're tense.' Sam stated, watching Cas watch the rain. He pitied Castiel. From what Anna had told him he was just lost. He wasn't like the usual patients who came in complaining about broken marriages and childhood traumas. Castiel just wanted someone to listen, and he wanted answers, not knowing where else he could get them from. He was going to try to give him answers.

Castiel nodded and turned back around to face Sam, greeted with a small smile. 'I am.'

'I grew up in this town, it's a nice place and I know it well, everyone's real friendly., but of course you'd know that...you live here too.' Sam nodded along to Castiel's words. 'And then when I got to middle school I realised people were disappearing, I guess you might have seen that in the papers or on the news though.'


	2. In which Castiel remembers he is lonely

'Disappearing?' Sam repeated, raising an eyebrow slightly. He wrote something down in the small black book that sat on his knee, lifting the book, keeping his words away from Castiel's line of sight. He didn't care, he didn't want to know what Sam thought of him. He just cared about what other people thought about him because psychologists can't judge, it's not allowed in their job description.

Castiel tried hard not to judge people based upon appearances or the first words the uttered to him but it was becoming increasingly hard. He wasn't surprised if they did the same to him in return, he expected it even. Cas wanted to conform and fit in, copy those around him, but at the same time he wanted to be different and special and interesting, not another robot like the ones he saw at school, little metal people that clanked around in their little matching outfits.

'I'm not crazy.' Castiel stated. He leaned back in the chair, resting his hands in his lap, fingers looped together, looking up as if asking the ceiling for guidance, that or God. He didn't know whether to believe in him anymore. He crossed his legs at the shins and tucked his feet under the chair, trying to make himself a little bit smaller than he actually was. Castiel reminded Sam of a little hedgehog, rolling himself up in a ball and trying to hide from the big bad world, spines out to keep people away. 'I'll make you open up' Sam thought. He sketched a little doodle of a hedgehog next to his scattered notes on Castiel, his behaviour, his body language, the way his voice changed when he talked about different subjects. He ended up writing more than he intended to but he guessed it was better to write too much about the pale bodied man rather than too little. Sam restrained himself from copying Castiel's awkward body language and it made him slightly sad that he sat in such a way, posture defeated. It wasn't right. The man before him was twenty one, at the prime of his life. He should be off doing what he wanted to do and not shying away from everything that came to him. Sure, at Castiel's age he wasn't exactly ruling the world but he partied, got drunk, traveled a bit. He'd ticked things of his list and he'd been a stereotypical college student. Cas had aged before his time and it wasn't fair.

Castiel had already gone through the 'am I crazy?' phase multiple times, beginning in high school when nobody else said they could hear or hear anything, despite the shadows peeping through doors and speaking through vents, making him feel like he was going mad. All alone inside a muddled head where no feasible connections could be made as to why people he knew were going missing. Fine one day and stuck in a big black hole the next, slowly swallowing the life force out of him. He heard voices more often than he'd like to admit, whispers that sounded pretty in his mind. They calmed him down. The voices grew stronger and louder as he grew older, and more joined in too. They said nothing of value though, mainly speaking between themselves about the past and how they wished it was still like that. They were of no use. They couldn't help him with answers in math tests or with how to successfully flirt with someone. He heard something of interest a while back; gates were opening and things were becoming free. The voices panicked and faded away for quite a long time then, but they came back soon enough.

'I didn't say you were, please continue.' Sam said softly, relaxing as Castiel did the same, uncrossing his legs and looking overall less worried about everything. Sam didn't imagine Castiel would be this way. He thought he'd look younger and weirder. From what Anna had told him he expected to see a wreck of a young man walk into his office, maybe wiped out on painkillers if he were to really think the worst, but Cas looked, if not sleepy, pretty normal.

Sam remembered the time he had at Stanford, he knew what it was like to be a student at university, cramming for papers in the twenty four hour library, living on shitty money and forgetting to eat half the time, but then again those were the happiest days of his life, finally getting away from his dysfunctional family and getting to meet people who weren't into hunting monsters. He didn't speak to his dad anymore but he couldn't shake Dean away from him. He didn't particularly want to either. Sometimes he missed the life he could've fallen into.

'In middle school I knew this guy called Harry, we weren't exactly friends but he was nice to talk to sometimes. He was bullied...well no, not bullied, but he was teased a lot because he liked superheros and I felt so sorry for him because he really was a nice guy.' Castiel stopped, taking a well needed breath, running a hand through his dark hair anxiously. Sam noted it down. 'One day he just stopped coming to school.' Castiel dropped his hands and put them on his knees. 'I think he thought I was his friend, and I was sort of, but he could be so annoying that sometimes i'd find myself wishing he'd just leave me alone, but then I guess he did.'

'What was it like for you at school?' Sam asked, hoping Castiel would confide in him and tell him something that would make sense of the situation.

'It was good, I had friends. I mean, I wasn't a part of the popular group, I never played sports so I couldn't be a jock or date cheerleaders, not that I'd want to by the way.' Castiel laughed, looking up at Sam with a charming something in his eyes. Sam smiled in return, happy to see him momentarily happy. 'But I had a nice group of friends and even some of the more popular kids liked me. So f you're trying to guess whether I was bullied then the answer is no. I dressed right, I spoke right and I studied hard.' Castiel looked off into the wall, staring at nothing, just remembering. 'I had a crush on the sports teacher.' he laughed softly. 'I didn't tell anyone that though.'

'Because that would've got you bullied?'

'Of course it would have, I had to pretend to like girls.'

Sam gave up on the notion of a bad time in high school. 'Maybe Harry moved house?' Sam offered, chewing his pen, realising what he was doing and wiping the drooled upon lid on the side of his blazer. If Castiel saw then he didn't care.

'I worked at a store when I was sixteen, my dad wouldn't buy me a car so I was saving up to get my own. He and his mother would come in sometimes and he'd say hello, so no, I don't think he moved, he would have told me.'

'He could've transferred schools?' Sam suggested, writing down something about Castiel's father. He watched as Cas shook his head opposite him.

'I just know that he didn't.' Castiel said firmly. He hesitated. 'It's going to sound insane but his mother...her eyes. One time they were both at the checkout and her eyes sort of slid to black, then back to the usual brown.' He closed his own eyes for a minute, rubbing the pink bridge of his nose where his glasses had slid. 'Harry just looked at me, as if he were asking for help, I was too dumb to do anything though, I mean what could I do? I was sixteen.' He took his glasses off altogether, pulling out a cleaning cloth and rubbing the lenses. He looked nice without glasses, younger maybe.

Sam's eyes grew wider. If it was one of these cases then he'd have to call Dean about it.

'You don't believe me, do you?' Castiel smiled. He smiled because he was bored of being angry. He used to hate it when they didn't believe him, wanting to beat it into them that he wasn't wrong, that they just weren't looking hard enough for answers. His own parents didn't believe him, they were worried for him.

'You'd be surprised actually.' It was odd to see a psychiatrist grin wolfishly. Sam was excited though.

'They threatened to take me to a mental hospital you know?' Castiel laughed, shaking his head slightly. He looked up at the stag head. 'I thought about admitting myself one night, I packed a bag and everything.'

The memory flashed back, him coming back from school to see his mom and dad, his two brothers sitting around the table. 'Sit.' they'd said, beckoning for him to come closer, their faces plastered with fake smiles, blank underneath, except for Gabriel who was sat playing on his game boy and swore silently at the screen and his fingers that couldn't move fast enough. Castiel already knew what it was about- he'd complained about not being able to sleep because there was someone speaking to him and keeping him awake the night before. It wasn't fair, Gabriel and Michael had had the same thing when they were younger, it's just that they grew out of it and what they had were labelled as 'imaginary friends'. They said he had one more chance to stop this nonsense or he was gone and he couldn't come back until he was 'normal'. He almost blurted that he was gay that night, just to get it over with, but he kept that in because he knew that'd get him sent there straight away, voices or no voices. He nodded when his mother and father spoke and smiled through their words, then went upstairs and got out his duffel bag, throwing in a couple of items of clothing, guessing they'd give him things to wear when he was there, identifying him as a patient and not a visitor, mentally ill instead of sane, and some books, then he zipped up the bag and sat cross legged on the bed, shaking his head repeatedly, not sure whether to laugh or cry. He did an odd mix of the both, burying his head in his hands. After he was all cried out he got up, smoothing down his clothes, and shoved the duffel bag under his bed, ready for when he was. He was only seventeen, he didn't want to be crazy yet.

'Who's they?' Sam asked, although he could already guess the answer.

'My parents, even my friends, so I just stopped talking about it, but people didn't stop disappearing and I didn't stop hearing voices. Harry was just the beginning.'

Castiel began to fidget again, running his hands on the arms of the chair, tapping his fingers. Sam watched him, transfixed on the pattern he was tapping out.

'Do you think Harry died?' he asked, falling out of the trance.

'I think his mother killed him.'

…

Castiel sat in his car after his session with Sam, an outdated Ford, head resting on the steering wheel, desperately trying to not touch the horn and startle himself. He wearily switched on the radio to the classical station and let himself become unaware for a moment, listening for the voices that had been leaving him alone for so long now. They still weren't talking. It was still raining outside but less now than before, more an annoying drizzle than anything.

He'd never felt more alone. He almost wanted them to come back and say hello. That was the madness talking Cas reminded himself. He wanted to go home but he couldn't bring himself to leave yet, just taking a moment in the car to reflect on what he'd told Sam. He always ended up telling them too much, first Anna and now him.

He leaned back against the seat and changed the station to some manufactured pop music, turning it down so it was barely audible. It was all so annoying. He picked out his phone from the backpack that drooped on the back seat; two new messages.

The first was from Becky, something about the paper they were meant to have completed in the next couple of weeks, asking if he could help her. He didn't want to but he would, remembering the time that she bailed him out after he'd been drinking all night and handing in his work whilst he lay passed out on the floor, visiting later on to give him her notes.

The second was from Gabriel, asking him if he wanted to go out for drinks sometime. He didn't know how to answer that. He supposed that he'd better go and have at least one drink with his brother even though he did get stupid when he was with him. Gabe always was his favourite of the two, he just forgot to keep in touch with him a lot of the time.

He looked out across the parking lot, nearly deserted except for a black car and a couple of silver ones. It was beginning to get darker, the sky painted a shade of blue darker than the colour he'd seen walking into the psychiatrists, the clouds now less fluffy and more stretched across and strained, shielding the sun as it decided it was time to be heading home, welcoming the moon to reign for a little while, always watching from the other side of the world. Right now Cas could see neither, no sun, or moon, or stars, just an empty blue portrait. The early spring brought less darkness and more light to the night. It was the sort of blue that reminded Cas of a sweater he used to own, its frayed edges and unraveled wool the clouds.

Castiel squinted, putting on the glasses that sat on his dashboard, reflecting reflections of the windshield. He looked into the black car for a moment. The man inside looked like he was having some kind of seizure. What if he's epileptic, Castiel thought, trying to think about what he should do. He had no medical training but maybe he could phone an ambulance and make sure didn't get worse. He grabbed his phone and he hesitated, then flung open the car door, almost running to the car that sat opposite to him in the lot, and then stopped in the center of the two cars. He saw that it was the guy from the waiting room, drumming with his hands on the steering wheel, 'Heat of The Moment' escaping through open windows. Castiel stopped still. 'God damn it.' he said under his breath. He scolded himself for always doing things like that, acting on stupid whims, his mind telling him that people were in danger when they were in anything but. Why did he try? He just made a fool of himself in front of one of the most beautiful guys he had ever laid eyes upon, and he was greeted with a strange look.

'Dude, are you okay?' Dean said, sticking his head out of the window almost comically, looking...concerned? Cas stood there, arms pressed to his sides, fingers curling into fists. He tilted his head slightly and squinted. 'I'm fine.' he said in a monotone.

'Are you on some high? What did Sammy do to you...or are you upset by my music, everybody loves Asia.' he laughed. Castiel didn't return the warmities, turning and slowly walking back to the car. He got back in, safe inside his little metal box. If only car windows were opaque and not so horribly transparent. 'What if he's watching me' Cas thought. He pulled off his glasses, rubbing his tired eyes, stealing a glance at himself in the rear view mirror. He looked terrible and his shaking hands rummaged inside the glovebox, pulling out a pack of cigarettes and an old silver Zippo that had been in there since he got the car.

'Smoking is bad for you.' he said to himself quietly, almost mockingly, lighting one up and inhaling, closing his eyes. He never used to smoke so regularly. He blew smoke slowly out of his mouth, taking his time with all his actions, his frantic hands now subdued for a little while. He was finshed.

His gaze again fell upon the black car, what the guy had said was an 'Impala' back in the waiting room. He was drumming again, facial expressions to match, mouthing along over dramatically to the words. Castiel smiled, dropping his barely used cigarette out of the window. 'Bad habit.' he smiled 'Need to stop.'

He sat for a good couple of minutes just watching Dean, then pulled out of the lot.

Sam Winchester watched him leave from the window in his office and pulled out his phone, scrolling down the numbers of patients and selecting one. Well, Dean wasn't exactly a patient, but he did come and see Sam at least once a week. They'd talk about their childhood, hunting, and Dean would sometimes let Sam dig things up about him and analyse him. After leaving Stanford, Sam would do it regularly with Dean, picking things out from everything he'd say, relating things he did to case studies; Sam compared him to Pavlov's dog when he saw pie, and Dean hated it, his mind being infiltrated and opened up when he wanted his fears and doubts to be kept in the dark, but then he began to give permission and it all proved to be quite therapeutic.

'Dean, that guy thinks he saw a demon.' he said calmly, watching his brother in the space below. He'd seen Castiel walk over to the Impala and then stop, and it had been on his mind for a good couple of minutes as to why he did it.

'Whatever happened to patient confidentiality Sammy?' Dean replied sarcastically. He was partly serious, it wasn't particularly good practice to go and reveal someones secrets after a session, even if they were brothers.

Sam shrugged his shoulders even though he knew it was a gesture that Dean wouldn't see.

'Is that guy crazy because he looks kinda crazy.' Dean asked him, tapping away at his steering wheel. 'He walked over and then stopped a few minutes ago.'

'I think he's confused, not crazy. Keep an eye on him will you?' Sam asked, glancing at his appointment book.

'Sure thing.' Dean replied, hanging up almost instantly.

Dean pulled out, trying to remember which way he'd gone, whilst Sam welcomed in his 5 o'clock.

…

He'd changed as soon as he arrived home, shedding his clothes, changing into some old shorts and a navy blue t-shirt. Castiel owned way to many running clothes for his needs, assorted tops and bottoms that sat neatly folded in the bottom drawer of his dresser, his wardrobe home to multiple pairs of shoes even though he always fell back on the same old pair. Running was a thing he enjoyed though, loved even, a method of clearing his mind as each foot hit the ground, each step an ounce of worry gone for a little while.

Castiel lived in a nice suburban area, a place where nothing bad should ever happen, but it still did sometimes, odd little things like minor house fires that put people in motels for a couple of days, a string of robberies last year that put the neighbor hood watch on guard. It was all white picket fences and pools in backyards, neither of which Cas had, opting for less of a bright green lawn and more of an emerald jungle in his yard. He liked to garden. It was calming. The neighbors were friendly enough, sending smiles and waves Castiel's way as he picked up his mail in the morning, and doing the same whilst they closed curtains as he went for his evening jogs. It wasn't his house technically, he hadn't got the lease changed yet. It was his parents house, the house he grew up in, but first his dad had died, and then his mom, leaving an empty house full of furniture. He thought about selling it, splitting the money between him, Gabriel and Micheal, using his share to buy a bigger, slightly less horrible flat whilst he finished his course at university, but then decided to just have the house himself. Neither of his brothers complained, except for Gabriel who asked for the family silver before Castiel moved in. The house was way too big for him and he had three spare bedrooms that went along unused, but sometimes he liked the echos when he spoke aloud to himself, other times not so much.

He rifled through the cupboards, realising he was going to have to go shopping sometime that week, pulling out a half empty box of Cheerios and making his way to the couch to eat. He crossed his legs, resting the bowl of cereal between the cross, flicking on the television whilst he shoveled food into his mouth. The weather told him there was a storm coming before he changed the channel to The Walking Dead. What could Castiel say? He loved zombies. He switched off the tv after the episode had ended and all the cereal was gone, trudging up the stairs and flopping into bed, setting the alarm on his phone to go off after two hours.

He woke up, eyes sticky with sleep, rubbing it away and pushing his glasses onto his sleepy face. He left the bed un-made, even though a pillow had somehow made its way onto the floor in the process of his nap, and went downstairs to make a cup of coffee, needing caffeine before he went out.

He figured that going on jogs every night would cancel out the occasional cigarettes and excessive tea and coffee drinking.

He left the house, not bothering to lock the door behind him, just clicking it shut, then started slowly up the street, more walking than running, deciding he'd go by the river tonight. He'd maybe find a bench and sit for a while, watch the water ripple and shimmer as it reflected the moon, make his way home when the sky went black and dotted with stars. He hadn't done that for a while.

His thoughts were interrupted by the subtle buzzing in his pocket. Cas fished out his phone-It was Henry.

'Hey Cas, do you mind if I run with you tonight?' The familiar voice asked on the opposite side of the phone. Cas could almost see him on the other side.

'Henry we haven't run together since...' Cas began. They hadn't done anything together since the argument they'd had a few weeks back. It had all resulted in tears and a slightly damaged door. They had been sitting on the sofa watching tv, Henry looping one arm around Castiel's waist, rubbing his fingers along Cas' hip bone where his shirt had ridden up. Cas had brought his knees up onto the couch and leaned into Henry's touch, fitting his head under Henry's neck, resting lazily against his chest. 'So I was thinking maybe you could stay with me for a while.' Cas had suggested, entwining his fingers with Henry's. 'How long hon?' he'd replied, squeezing his hand in return, knowing Castiel liked response to his affection. 'Forever?' Castiel had laughed and Henry had laughed too, running a hand through Cas' hair 'Seriously though, how long?' Castiel had bitten his lip and looked down at the carpeted floor 'Well I was thinking maybe you could move in, I get lonely living on my own.'. He lifted himself from Henry's chest, rearranging himself so he sat cross legged opposite Henry's profile, watching him intently to see his response. 'Castiel, baby...we've only been together for six months.' Henry had said, not sure if he should keep smiling for Castiel's sake- he knew how attached he could get and how infatuated he seemed to be. 'I know, I just thought-' Cas had began, cut off by Henry saying no and apologising, saying that he needed some time on his own for a little while. Castiel had stayed on the sofa as Henry left and he heard the front door close. 'Idiot.' Castiel said to himself 'Idiot.' he repeated, putting his head in his hands and breathing deeply. 'Idiot!' He got up, kicking the door with his sock clad foot, hissing as he made contact with the painted wood, recoiling with the pain. He punched it, watching blood bead on his knuckles as his hands remained as fists. He punched it again, tears clouding his vision slightly and wetting his cheeks. 'Idiot.' he said quietly as he walked to the kitchen and fetched the first aid kit, bandaging up his hand and flexing his fingers. Henry had called that night and broke it off, saying that it wasn't Castiel, it was him, he wasn't ready for commitment yet.

'I know, just come meet me for old times sake.' Castiel could see Henry smiling as he spoke.

'I guess so, the usual spot then?'

There was a pause. 'I've forgotten the usual spot.'

Castiel was surprised that Henry couldn't remember-they'd been meeting there for ages to run. It was also the place where Henry had given Castiel his first kiss from a guy and his first blow job some time later, right there in public after dark, trying to muffle the dirty noises that spouted from his mouth. He wasn't forgetting that for a long time.

'The park, by the hazel tree.' Castiel said slowly, trying to spark some kind of memory in Henry's head.

'Sure.'

Castiel hung up. He really wanted to see Henry and simultaneously punch him in the face. There was no going back on this, he couldn't try to hide or run. He had to face this. He jogged slowly to 'their' tree, not wanting to be the first one there and have to stand there looking like he had some kind of purpose. He sighed slightly with relief; he wasn't.

'Cas, hey.' Henry waved, jogging over and hugging him. Cas broke it off earlier than expected. 'You're hugging me? You said I was the needy one.' Castiel remarked with venom in his voice. Henry had said that on the phone, he said that Cas got attached too quickly and acted needy and sometimes he was too touchy and he had no concept of personal space. The list continued after that. Castiel listened to the receiver in silence as Henry told him everything that was wrong, wanting to point out Henry's flaws too but he couldn't think of any except for him leaving socks in the kitchen.

'Oh don't be like that.' he pouted. 'I really miss you Cas.'

'Yeah I've missed you too...shall we run then?' Cas said, a statement not a question, wanting to change the subject as quickly as possible. Henry nodded, bending over and stretching, revealing skin as he did so, the slight v of his hips peeping from beneath his shorts. Castiel looked away.

Henry stopped stretching and smiled at Cas, eyes crinkling. 'Okay?' he asked. 'Okay.' Cas replied, starting down the gravel path that circled the park, Henry not far behind. He could hear his own heavy breath as well as Henry's next to him. 'One more lap then we rest.' Henry panted, a thin film of sweat having formed on his face. Castiel made a small noise in agreement, growing slightly tired, the strain of his feet banging off the hard ground putting strain on his calves. At least he didn't have a build up of lactic acid.

He was glad to rest when they did, massaging his legs as they sat on the grassy bank for a while. 'The stars look nice tonight.' Henry commented, and Castiel lifted his head up to look. They did look nice, like little opal stones set in a big piece of raw sapphire. They flashed in the sky, lighthouses for space ships, Cas' mom always used to say, guiding the astronauts home.

'Drink?' Henry said, thrusting a bottle in Castiel's direction, and Cas took it gratefully. He was glad that Henry was being civil with him and not acting like a little bitch. 'Hey, I was thinking, maybe I could move in with you?' Henry grinned wolfishly, making Castiel feel like a piece of red meat beneath an animals glare. Cas looked at the ground. 'I don't think that's a very good idea.' he mumbled, not able to look him in the eye. The ship had sailed and Castiel was better with living alone now. He glanced at Henry to see his reaction to the change of heart.

Henry was a good looking guy; tall with the best cheekbones Castiel had ever seen, shadowed and angled by the retracting light, and familiar lips that made him quiver when they met his. He felt lucky to have ever been with him.

They had met at university one rainy day, the sky grey and threatening with clouds that stretched across the campus. Castiel was walking back from a lecture on Greek Mythology, a topic he particularly enjoyed, when the Heaven's opened upon him, fat droplets of rain falling upon his bare arms. He'd taken his backpack from his back and held it above his head as a substitution shield to the weather, calculating in his head how long it would take for him to get home if he walked, taking shelter in an alcove for a moment to see if the rain would let up. He pulled his sticky shirt away from his skin and ruffled his damp hair, looking for a break in the clouds. 'It's not gonna be stopping anytime soon.' A guy said to Cas, standing in front of the shelter, an umbrella in one hand, books in the other. Castiel sighed in response 'No point in waiting then.' He stepped out into the rain, braced for it to hit him, but instead falling above him as the umbrella was placed above his head. Castiel turned to face the guy who held it above him. 'Henry.' he said, tucking his books under his arm and holding out his hand for Cas to shake, a grin plastered on his face, charmingly heroic. 'Castiel.' He said in return 'and you really don't have to.' he said, looking up at the umbrella. The campus was deserted except for the two of them and a professor who eyed them as he crossed from one building to another, a disapproving expression drawn upon him. 'It's fine, I want to.' Henry shrugged. 'How about I walk you home, I can't leave you all alone on such a rainy day.' he offered in earnest, his face open, thinking of himself as some kind of modern day hero, another random act of kindness ticked off his list. 'Okay, that'd be nice.' They had walked back to Castiel's flat of the time, making small talk along the way to the sets of secluded grey buildings that loomed into the sky, and hurried to the fourth floor up the stairs, the lift temporarily out of order, simply glad to be out of the rain. 'You gonna come in?' Cas asked, unlocking the door, Henry following him inside, surveying Castiel's home. 'Tea? Coffee?' Cas asked, fetching a towel from the bathroom to dry himself off as much as it was possible to do so and throwing one to Henry who was considerably more wet as he focused on holding the umbrella over Cas on the journey back. Henry followed Cas into the kitchen, watching him make drinks, accepting his gratefully and again following Cas who patted the seat next to him on the sofa. Henry left later than he originally intended to, getting caught up in a movie, kissing Castiel sweetly as he left. 'How did you know?' Cas asked, blush creeping along his cold cheeks, wondering if he had a sign around his neck that said 'kiss me, i'm gay'. 'You invited me in and offered me coffee, in popular culture that suggests you want to...y'know.' Henry replied, picking up his abandoned umbrella and almost slipping down the stairs, wet with other people's rain soaked shoes. Cas moved house shortly after that, into his current one, searching for Henry on the campus to tell him, fretting all the time that Henry didn't care and was just hoping to get laid that night after saving some gullible fool from the rain. Henry apparently did care though, visiting the address that Cas had hurriedly scrawled on the back of a receipt with a house warming present-whiskey, Castiel's biggest weakness. They drank, they made out, they argued about which Star Trek captain was greater, (Cas going with Picard and Henry with Kirk) and they almost had sex, Castiel having to stop and redress himself after he began to laugh too much about a tattoo Henry had. Then they were unspokenly dating. Even Cas had to admit that they'd had a good run in their short six months. He took a break from dating after Henry, focusing on his studying, doing better than he ever had in class.

Back in the present Henry leaned forward, touching Castiel's hand and giving it a squeeze 'You could move in with me then.' he smiled, catching Castiel's lips lightly and closing the space between them. Castiel didn't complain, classically conditioned to kiss him back harder.

'You haven't shaved.' Henry commented, stroking Cas' cheek with his finger. Castiel shook his head, smirking into Henry's lips and wrapping his arms around his neck, pulling him as close as he could, kissing him again with more force, their lips rough against each other.

God, he'd forgotten how much he and Henry clicked and how good they were for each other. He had missed him so much. 'You been with anyone since me?' Cas breathed, taking a small break from Henry's mouth then bringing himself back in. Henry sucked his bottom lip, the dirtiest of moans coming from Castiel's mouh 'No, I've just been thinking about you...everywhere, when I'm studying, when I'm with friends, when I'm in the shower...' Henry whispered suggestively, leaving little pecks on Cas' jaw line after ever place, moving down to his neck as Castiel tipped his head back. He wanted to take this so much further, so much faster.

'Slow down there, Angel.' Henry smiled, slightly peeling Cas off him. 'You're such a little slut sometimes.'

Castiel sat back, his lips raw and red, giving a questioning look towards Henry, bemused as his eyes changed from their usual blue to a colour he knew all to well, and ultimately he knew what it meant. Inky eyes met his.

'Hi.' It smiled sweetly, Henry's face lighting up. 'Boy, you're a good kisser for someone who looks so dorky.' it leaned forward 'I mean look, your glasses are all askew.' he fixed them for Cas, touch lingering on his face.

'How do you always find me, do I have to move to Canada, then will you get off my tail?' Castiel said, getting gradually louder, anger beginning to boil inside him. He wanted to live a normal suburban life, to not have everyone around him die, to get married someday and adopt kids and know they were safe when they went outside, to not be stalked by some black-eyed freak.

'I need you Castiel, more than you know.' it said, ignoring his previous comment, almost pulling of a strange black eyed puppy dog look before flicking its eyes back to Henry's, then back to black as soon as it happened.

'What are you?' Cas said quietly, slowly backing away with his hands, stumbling to get up from his sitting position, managing to stand up.

He was answered with a fist to the jaw as it stood up, mirroring his previous movements, Castiel thrown back onto the ground with the force and unexpectedness of the attack. It leaned over him as he rubbed his sore face, heart currently beating a mile a minute. 'Where did you find yourself such a nice little body?' It asked, kicking Castiel in the ribs before he had chance to get up, making him want to curl up in a ball and die.

'What?' Cas said, voice slightly hoarse as he held the side of his chest, voice cracking as he questioned. He coughed.

'What?' he repeated, trying to make his head stop hurting from where it hit the floor. It shrugged, leaning over Cas who lifted his leg, kicking the thing hard in the stomach, catching it off guard for a moment giving him precious time to run. He scrabbled up from off his back, rolling to his stomach and bringing his legs forward to near his hips, the late dew of the grass giving him little resistance. Hand met ankle and pulled him back down. 'Oh no you don't.' It smiled. 'You've no idea how much I want to hurt you.'

Its eyes reverted to blue, scared and pleading, then back to black. 'But to hurt you I'd better hurt him, I know how to play this game.' he shrugged, pulling out a small silver dagger 'I could get him if you'd like, I can bury myself at the back of him so he'll feel it.' He sliced against Henry's pale skin, blood beading as the knife moved away, dribbling on long messy streaks down his arms. 'I won't though because i'm feeling generous today.' It pushed the dagger against Henry's stomach, lifting his t-shirt, and running the blade across lightly, barely touching skin. It hissed, trying not the recoil as it sliced deeper. 'If it hurts me, imagine how it feels for him, he's conscious in here, I can feel him screaming.'

'Stop it.' Cas whispered. 'Stop it.' he repeated louder, scrambling up, standing directly opposite and trying to wrestle away the dagger, only to be pushed back into a tree about ten feet away, back cracking as he hit the hard trunk, head lolling forward as he tried to not cough up his internal organs. He felt like he was going to vomit blood. It smiled, casually walking over to Cas' slumped figure, wrenching off Henry's t shirt and stooping to kiss Cas on the forehead. 'You're sick.' Cas muttered through gritted teeth, trying to regain some consciousness.

It smiled, pushing the dagger into Henry's stomach, groaning as it did so, closing it's eyes in pain as it twisted, blood beginning to seep out of the wound and out of Henry's mouth, coating his teeth with a sickly red layer. 'Henry's going to die because of you.' It sang, letting the knife stick vertically out of Henry's body. It looked like a scene from a low rent slasher film. Except in those the role Castiel played was usually a woman.

'Please, take me.' Cas lowered his gaze. 'Just take me, leave him alone.'

'Oh I will don't worry, I just want some fun first, he's probably dead now anyway.' It mock sighed, looking down at the dagger and beginning to wriggle it out of the open wound. 'Let's kiss again while he's not here, he's unconscious. I'm sorry that he didn't want you...in fact you sort of repel him because he thinks you need him too much.' It leaned forwards some more, blood leaving an oozing trail down his chin. 'It's about time I took you to the boss.'

Castiel jumped as a gunshot cried out through the park, his breath ragged and body tired as he moved, just avoiding the ruined body of Henry falling on top of him, trying not to gag as he saw his former boyfriend face down on the ground, blood pooling beneath him. He hoped he was dead so he didn't have to feel any pain.

Castiel looked up, looking up under his lashes, a struggle just to keep his eyes open. He was wrecked.

'Are you following me?' He said angrily as he could, despite realising he'd just been saved from a black eyed freak, trying to wipe away where that...thing had kissed him with the back of his hand

'You're in danger you idiot, don't thank me for killing that thing either.' Dean shouted, lightly poking the body that lay limply on the floor with his toe, a groan coming from Henry's dying frame.

Castiel kneeled, wondering whether to show some kind of fleeting affection to Henry, holding his head in his hands. 'Don't die, we'll get you to a hospital, please, don't die.'

Henry shook his head and smiled at Castiel, closing his eyes. 'I know it hurts.' Castiel couldn't get the words out of his throat.

'Call 911, tell them where he is, but right now you need to follow me.' Dean said offhandedly over his shoulder, already leaving the scene.

'But...'

'Seriously, shut up and i'll buy you a drink, explain things to you.'

Castiel stood up cautiously and did as he was told, wondering when his ears were going to stop ringing and his body stop feeling like he'd been hit by a truck. he wasn't going because he wanted to, but because he wanted the answers that Dean may be able to offer.


	3. it's probably not a good idea for Dean and Castiel to drink

Castiel sat hunched over in the front seat of the Impala, wondering if Dean would consider it rude if he turned down the music a tiny bit, the harsh pounding of the drums making his head pulse rhythmically. He decided against it, he'd sort of had his life saved after all. To compare a headache to whatever that thing was going to do to him seemed ungrateful in Cas' eyes. He still hadn't thanked Dean for doing what he had in the nick of time; his head was more buried in the ultimate certainty of Henry's death. He doubted there would be any chance of anyone saving him and he was oddly at peace with it which worried him as much as it bemused him. He had called for an ambulance with remarkably still hands, death now commonplace in his short life. He said where Henry was and turned his back on the crumpled body, walking away from the wreckage as it went up in flames, picking up his pace to walk alongside Dean's stature and trying not to look to see if the sun was setting behind them, their silhouettes an odd crime fighting duo where he didn't solve much crime at all but got dragged along for the ride anyway. He didn't want to go to a bar with Dean, but he didn't want to be there when they loaded the bloodied body inside the ambulance, only to prove Castiel's suspicions that he was already cold and gone. They probably wouldn't even try to revive him. They'd question him on what happened to him and he'd have to scrape together some half-hearted tale of a mugging that he witnessed from afar. If he mentioned anything about black eyes they'd have him shipped to a ward where he'd have to wear white and hang around with other people who could hear voices and see bad things. They'd have him sit in circles and discuss why what he saw wasn't real and he'd get angry and hit things and have to stay in a padded room for a while. He didn't want that. He wanted to go home and watch Cake Boss, look at pictures of Henry and tell himself not to cry, fall asleep with the medication that he'd got really good at not taking. Instead he had to make small talk with some overcompensating alpha male in a rough bar.

'You doing okay there?' Dean said, eyes fixed on the road, his profile illuminated on and off by passing car headlights, his sharp jaw line outlined and his lips slightly parted with a small smile as he drove, Castiel's eyes falling upon his every feature and wanting to take it all in before the light passed on to new things and better places.

Dean looked to the side slightly, aware of Castiel's gentle gaze upon him, almost embarrassed by it as Cas looked out of the window at the passing scenery as to not get caught staring. Dean smiled to himself at how innocent he looked as he watched the world pass by him, a simple blur of trees and dusty road. He was flattered. 

'I'm fine thank you.' Cas replied curtly, putting his hands in his lap. He shouldn't be here, in some strange mans car listening to old rock music and trying to not hurl himself out of the car hard enough to kill himself. His head was currently a minefield and he was inside it trying not to set anything off and blow half of his sanity up. Dean's face was calming though, a shadowed safety blanket on the other side of the field that coaxed him forward. He wanted it.

Dean opened the glove box, looking up at the road as he rummaged, sifting through for something. He pulled out various crumpled pieces of paper and balled them up, one hand on the wheel, throwing them by his feet. 'Sorry baby' he muttered (and Cas rolled his eyes at that), still looking for something without the help of eyesight, his hand finally curling around a box and handing it to Cas. 'Here, these should help.'

Dean looked down at the box Dean had thrust into his hand, furrowing his brow. 'Dean, you just handed me a box of condoms.' he said quietly, staring at the box intently, not sure how to comprehend the situation. Dean kept condoms in his car he thought. Maybe Dean had sex so spontaneously that he had to have them on hand at all times. Cas pulled a face. 

'Wrong box.' Dean muttered, passing him a small box of plasters that apparently lived with the condoms in the glove box. He took the condoms back from Cas, shoving them inside without a word. 'Thanks.' Cas said, watching as Dean's straight face began to crack into a smile, which soon turned into a grin. 'I just passed you condoms.' he chuckled. Cas laughed awkwardly in return out of politeness, laughs that turned real as Dean began to giggle like a twelve year old who'd just heard the word penis amongst his other twelve year old friends. It was an infection and the car was festering. They sat in the front of the Impala, Dean almost convulsing, and Cas laughing in return at Deans strained expression. For a moment Cas didn't want to go home. 

'Dude, I'm gonna have to pull over a minute.' Dean said through gritted teeth as he tried to control himself, almost unable to breathe as he pulled into the side of the road, holding his stomach as he let go of the wheel. 'I handed you condoms.' he repeated, shaking his head. 'Why am I laughing so hard? It's not even funny.' He asked Cas, who sat chuckling shotgun, gulping air, forgetting that he was hurting all over. 'Beats me.' Cas replied, exhaling and trying to regain seriousness, a feat proving to be impossible when he had a twenty-something in the seat next to him who couldn't stop howling at his stupid mistake.

Dean opened his door and got out for a moment, Cas watching as he stepped outside and rested himself on the side of the Impala head down, trying to calm himself down, realising that as long he was in the car with Castiel he'd be laughing, remembering Cas' expression as he handed back the box. He breathed in and out and put on a straight face, losing it as soon as he got back into the car and cracking a smile.

'Don't look at me like that.' Dean snorted as Cas looked up at him with watery blue eyes. 'Large though, am I right?'

'Shut up.'

'Well that broke the ice.' Dean coughed, casting off the last of his sniggers and watching from the corner of his eye as Cas began peeling the backs off plasters and applying them to the cuts on his skin. He was mostly covered in bruises though, and Dean felt sorry for him for when he would eventually woke up in the morning. He'd look like a galaxy, all purple and yellow tinged skin. 

Dean thought Cas had got off pretty lightly considering though and he felt quite pleased with himself that he'd got there in time. With Sam's request he had followed Cas, tracking him back to his house, waiting up the street for a while until he left the house in a pair of shorts that Dean thought were just adorable. He left the car there, opting to follow on foot to seem slightly less perdatory and more 'casual stranger who happened to be travelling that way'.

By the time Cas got to the park Dean had discovered that he was incredibly suspicious, looking back multiple times, almost catching Dean behind him once as he couldn't quite duck behind a car fast enough. Castiel didn't like dogs, especially small ones, and sometimes he liked to stop and smell flowers as long as nobody was looking. 

He watched from afar as Cas met with some guy and they began to run-a hobby he never really understood- not sure quite what do do with himself, choosing to park himself on a bench for a while, subtly secluded but still able to see as Cas and his jogging buddy about a hundred feet off as they sat down on the grass. 

He averted his gaze as they began to get touchy feely, then looked again, curious as to what they would do. He almost felt proud of Castiel for getting himself some action, even if it was with a guy. And even Dean, who believed himself to be straight as an heavy iron girder, had to admit that Henry was good looking as far as males went. 

But then he saw Cas backing away, and he saw Cas get punched in the face for his troubles, wincing with second hand pain. He stayed put, it could just be a lovers tiff in which they punched each other to resolve issues. Last time he jumped to conclusions he ended up almost getting stabbed by a couple who just liked to play it rough in alleyways, and besides, Cas would know that he'd been following him if he stepped in for a simple punch. 

It all began to get rough then, an act of domination against Castiel as he was repeatedly pulled down and eventually got flung back painfully against a tree with strength that could only belong to a black-eyed bitch, his body flopped over and twisted. He was trying to get up though even though they both knew it would be of no use. 

Dean snaked around the park, running as he tried to make it so the demon wouldn't see him approaching and go in for his prey too quickly, taking a painfully long time to come behind it, having to make the noise of his footsteps sparse and his breaths shallow. He couldn't be too late. He had a duty to help. 

By that time he knew that Henry would already be dead, aware of the cuts that littered his body and the blood that pooled around his feet in a sad little thick puddle. And then he shot, right in the back of the head.. the Colt warm in his hands. He watched as Castiel held on to Henry as any essence of life left him, almost sad that Cas had such bad luck when it came to keeping people alive, and he looked so small and tired and desperate that Dean wanted to reach out to him, so he offered to get him drunk. Forget all your worries with good old uncle Dean, demon hunter by trade, compadre by night.

'Thank you, by the way.' Cas coughed, applying the final plasters to his legs. It was mainly his back that was cut up but he couldn't reach back there and there was no way he was asking Dean to do it for him, although it would be fun to see him go all red and stuttery. If he was in that mindset he could make Dean feel really uncomfortable and take him home, maybe even leave him to find his own way back. He would but his head hurt to much and so do the rest of his body. 

He remembered when he got into a fight back when he was sixteen over something stupid. He'd arrived home late, way past his already extended curfew, all bloodied and bruised, his parents asleep upstairs and unaware of the state their son was in. He had gone to Gabriel's room and asked him for help, met with refusal, saying Cas had got himself into this state and he'd have to get himself out, he was leaving for college soon and he couldn't always be there for him. But a little while later he softened and came in with the first aid kit and an unauthorised bottle of vodka that he'd stolen from his dad a while back just to spite him. He told Cas to drink some to numb the pain, and he did, coughing at the unfamiliar pure and fiery taste of it and feeling the burn slide down his throat in a manner most uncomfortable and slightly painful, telling himself that was the most disgusting thing he'd ever tasted. Gabriel rubbed it on his open wounds, calling Cas a baby when he hissed or winced. 'Did you swing first?' Gabriel asked, pressing the hastily melting ice pack that he'd swiped from the freezer to Castiel's face. 'Of course I did.' Cas replied with a slightly swollen lip. Gabriel nodded in approval, taking a small step back and seeing how Cas now looked after a bit of cleaning up. 'I should be a doctor...I'm doctor sexy.' he concluded, admiring his work.

Castiel, apart from a few scratches and a bit of blotchyness, looked pretty normal. 'You'll probably have lots of bruises by morning, but on the plus side you'll look like a total badass.' He offered Cas the bottle again but he declined, still cringing from the first swig. 'Thanks Gabe.' Cas said, barely audible, his voice cracking midway through, making him cough and try and regain some manliness. He wasn't going to cry but he felt like it.   
He knew Michael wouldn't have done anything and his mom and dad...they'd ask too many questions, his mom would fret and worry, and his dad would get mad and make Castiel confront the other boy, have them sit down and talk about it. Gabriel just got on with things in a manner that Cas admired. It wasn't the first time Gabriel had helped him out either. 'Don't tell mom.' Cas said, sitting cross legged on his bed, looking down at his jeans, which he noticed had a couple of blood spots on them. He wasn't sure whose blood it was, but he was pretty sure the other guy went home bleeding. 'You think she's not gonna notice you coming down for breakfast with a black eye?' Gabriel sat down opposite him and he smiled at his forlorn brother, putting his hand on Castiel's shoulder. 'We'll say I did it.' he said, watching as Cas lifted his head questioningly 'Tell mom I punched you.' He grinned, seemingly not having thought of the concequences that it would bring .Gabriel preferred to not think about things like that on the whole, and besides, he wanted to protect his little brother for as long as he could. The next day   
Castiel's mom didn't ask why Gabriel had punched Cas, she just nodded and got on with drying the dishes after taking a quick look at Castiel's black eye and mottled cheekbones. 

It wasn't spoken about again until Gabriel entered Cas' room one night about a week later, closing the door behind him. He pulled out the chair from by Cas' desk and sat himself down on it backwards, crossing his arms on the back of it as Castiel lay on top of his covers reading a book. 'Why'd you start the fight?' he asked, watching as Castiel buried his head deeper into the book, obviously uncomfortable 'I just got pissed off.' he mumbled, not taking his eyes off the pages, trying to somehow read harder and block everything else out. Gabriel grabbed his book and closed it, putting it behind him on the desk 'Hey!-' Cas started but he was silenced by a look of scorning. 'It's gotta be something...come on, you can tell me little brother.' Gabriel said, now resting his chin on the chair back and looking at Cas with understanding, puppy dog eyes that seemed to run in the family, except in comparison to Cas' pure blue, Gabriel's were a rusted iron colour. Cas crossed his arms, resting his head back on the pillow so he could look at the ceiling and not into the eyes that probed him.   
'He said I was gay.' Cas sighed, looking at the ceiling once more then looking at Gabriel. 'You started a fight with someone because they called you gay?' Gabriel repeated, raising an eyebrow and Castiel nodded 'That's stupid.' 

Cas nodded again more vigorously 'In hindsight.' The only reason it annoyed him so much was the truth behind it, that someone had seen through his tough guy act long enough for them to assume he was gay. Cas wondered where he had faltered, maybe it was because he spent to long looking at things like eyelashes that framed a guys eyes or his gaze lingered on their lips for slightly too long. 

He would never go for any of the people who went to his school though as they were all so predatory and primitive in his young eyes. He wanted intelligence and charm in a guy, someone who'd carry his books and walk him home and offered him shelter when it rained. He knew he wouldn't find anything remotely like it until he went to college. 'Gabriel, what if I am.' he said quietly, looking at his hands which lay linked together on his chest. Gabriel sighed 'Nothing wrong with it little brother, times have changed.' and Gabriel grinned and patted Castiel's head 'I had my suspicions anyway.' Cas sat up, tilting his head at his brother, silently telling him to carry on. Gabriel shuffled closer on the chair and lowered his voice 'You get to know the signs when you see them in yourself, but hey, you do a great job most of the time.' Castiel opened his mouth to speak but Gabriel shushed him   
'Yeah, we both came out of the closet today, glad I could tell you, you were further in the closet though.' 

Cas stared at his older brother for a while, wrapping it around his mind that he wasn't the only one in denial in the Novak family. All they needed was for Micheal to declare himself homosexual and they'd have a full house. He was amazed at how well Gabriel had kept it hidden from everyone. 'You have a girlfriend Gabe!' Cas exclaimed. He'd had a girlfriend for months now and it wasn't his first. Besides, from what Cas had seen and heard, Gabriel was pretty frisky with the ladies. He was the least likely candidate on Cas' people who could possibly be gay list.   
'Bisexual, means you can rock with anyone, means I get the best of both.' Gabriel smirked, reacting to Cas' startled expression. 'I'm gonna leave you to digest that.' Gabriel continued, leaving the room as Cas sat on the bed still dazed that he'd outed himself to his brother who was in fact himself bisexual. You couldn't make that stuff up. A voice rang out inside his head. They didn't hurt as much as they used to.

Back in the car Dean blushed.'It's fine, I wasn't following you by the way.' He added, wanting to make it clear to Castiel that he wasn't a creep who followed pretty boys on their way home. He just called Cas pretty he realised in his head. Dean internally shrugged, he was pretty and it was okay for him to say that because he could appreciate a nice face when one came along. Hell, boys could be pretty and so could girls. Cas was like a piece of art to him he thought, he could look him and prop him up somewhere to be admired but overall he had no purpose except to make the room look a bit nicer. It sounded less harsh in his subconscious.  
'It's okay, it's like you acted as a guardian angel or something.' Cas answered, box of the remaining plasters in his hand, wondering where to put them. Dean might not appreciate it if he tossed them on his 'baby's' dashboard. He held onto them awkwardly. He wanted to go home.  
How do you politely tell someone that you don't want their company.

…

The bar, surprisingly, wasn't that busy when Cas and Dean got there. Cas didn't care about what the time was but he could see a purple darkness ripping its way across the sky as they drove over. Dean led the way to a corner booth where they'd be mostly hidden by shadows and wouldn't be bothered by wondering eyes, not that there were many there to be watching. 'I'll get drinks.' Dean said, indicating for Cas to sit down which he did, eyeing up a suspicious stain on the padding of the seat and making sure not to plant himself down on it. He took off his glasses and wiped the lenses on his t shirt, and then it dawned on him as he looked down at his busy hands that he was wearing his running shorts in a bar of burly men and what he guessed were vagabonds. He checked out the damage on his glasses. One lens was a tiny bit scratched but other than that fine. He was glad that they didn't get broken, glasses were expensive after all. He chose to not put them back on, instead folding them and sitting them on the table that stood sticky with alcohol. He waited in a comfortable blur for Dean to come back, but after watching him for a while as he chatted to the barmaid Cas realised that maybe he wasn't going to. Cas saw him ooze confidence and she lapped it up, of course she would. Jealousy rose up inside him, a sickly heat prickling along his veins. He was invited here by him and Lord knows he wished he hadn't been, and there was Dean, eye fucking some floozy across a counter who probably only got tipped for the fact that half her breasts were showing. Then again maybe he was cynical. He stood up sharply, picking up his glasses from the table and sticking them in his short pockets. He felt better if he couldn't see anything crystal clear, and he marched over, hands balled into fists. He wasn't going to do any punching, he just wished he could. 'Two whiskeys please.' he barked, interrupting Dean's hilarious story about when he was in some pie eating contest with Sammy. She nodded, beginning to pour, Dean continuing with his story as she did so. He figured it was best to order two. Two meant he could take them back to the table, and if Dean chose to follow then they'd have one each, if not he'd drink both. 'Nice shorts.' she said as she put in a couple of ice cubes, and Dean smiled to himself, making Cas really want to punch him and wipe away the stupid expression that he wore on his face. 'I was running.' Cas said simply as the barmaid handed the glasses over, and he gave her a bill before taking them back to the table, sliding himself into the seat. He pulled out his phone and dialed Gabriel's number, chewing his lip, hearing him pick up after the third ring.

'Hey.' Cas said softly into the phone, just wanting to hear Gabriel's reassuring voice. Gabe would know what to do.

'Hey Cassie, what's up, need advice from the love master?' Gabriel replied, the smile in his voice making Cas perk up in return. He could hear noises in the background. He wouldn't be surprised if he had somebody with him. When did he not? He was a hive of excitement and the drones would always come buzzing by.

Castiel told Gabriel the situation he was currently put in and Gabriel cooed when he felt it was right to do. 'So is he hot?' he asked finally. Cas sighed slightly, that would change everything in Gabe's opinion. 'Yeah I guess he is.' He looked across at Dean who leaned on the bar, the way his body language worked so easily around her, and then he turned, catching Castiel as he stared and smiling the stupid smile that he gave Cas the first time they saw each other.

'Oh shit, oh shit, oh shit, oh shit.' Castiel whispered into the phone, gripping it closer to his ear. He hadn't even started drinking yet and his head was already spinning. Dean was intoxicating. He should drink he thought to himself, grabbing the glass and knocking the whiskey down his throat and banging the glass down on the table. He was used to the burn nowadays. He knew he should appreciate the taste more but he just wanted to lose his inhibitions for a while.

'What is it? Gabriel laughed, reacting to the panic in his brothers voice. Gabriel thought Cas was over reacting to the situation, his logic that if one fish wasn't biting then you should just try for another one...unless the fish was unbelievably good looking, but enough of the fish analogies. He heard the glass as it hit the table 'Are you drinking Cas?' He really hoped that Castiel wasn't going to inebriate himself. He always got in such a state.

'He's coming over.' Cas squeaked, putting on a calmer face as Dean slid in opposite him. 'Hey.' he said airily from across the table, acting like nothing had happened. Maybe he didn't think anything had, maybe Cas was over reacting like he always seemed to do. Henry was right- he was needy. And Dean wasn't gay.

'I've got to go, i'll speak to you later.' Cas said quickly into the phone, looking down at his legs as he spoke, not wanting to make any form of eye contact with Dean, who was looking at him curiously.

'No, keep me on I want to-' Castiel hung up on Gabriel, shoving his phone back into his pocket. Dean's knee brushed against his own, sending the smallest of shivers down his body.

'Hey.' Dean repeated, pushing a filled glass towards Cas 'I see you already started without me.' he said, nodding at the empty glass in front of Cas. Cas looked up at Dean, the way he smiled lightly to himself as if he was always in on some joke Castiel knew nothing about. It would be nice if the circumstances were different.

'You were preoccupied I guess.' Cas replied off handedly, trying to desperately make it seem like he way okay with what Dean had just done. He didn't really understand himself why he was so cut up about it. Dean was a guy, he flirted with girls. Castiel was gay and Dean was straight. But was it not basic social etiquette to stay with the person you'd invited out? He just felt lonely. If a guy worked at the bar Cas would probably do the same thing that Dean had done so who was he to get all huffy Cas concluded.

'You okay? You look pissed.' Dean asked, oblivious as always. He had gone to the bar to get drinks and then got talking to Hilary, a hunter he worked with a while back who in turn worked at the bar for cash when she was running low. Not everyone could work their way around credit card fraud. They talked about the time they raided a vampire nest, and Hilary got turned last minute, asking her if she'd been tempted to taste human blood recently and she admitted that she had. 'I will kill you if you step out of line.' Dean had whispered across the bar to her and she merely smiled at him. 'They're on the house.' she'd said as Dean tried to pay her and he thanked her and told her about the pie eating contest in which he came second place. He watched as Cas stormed over and ordered drinks, watched him as he took them back to the table and phoned someone. 'Friend of yours?' Hilary asked, wiping at the bar with a cloth. Business was running slow. 'I guess you could say that.' Dean replied, smiling at Cas who sat looking anxious as he listened intently to the voice on the other side of the phone, pressing it close to his face and talking in hushed tones. 'He's cute, I could just eat him up.' Hilary smirked, resting on her elbows and licking her lips for show. 'You lay a finger on him and i'll show no hesitation in ganking you, the poor kid's already been attacked by a demon tonight.' He walked over to Castiel at that point, sitting opposite him and trying to give him a reassuring smile.

'I'm fine, shook up I guess.' Cas sighed, staring into the glass, lifting and sipping it, letting the taste linger in his mouth. He wondered how many he'd need to get drunk. He'd built up some resistance to the stuff.  
Dean lifted his glass from across the table 'To Henry.' he said loudly, swallowing the whole contents of his glass. Cas recognised him as another person who didn't like to go slow with alcohol. Cas lifted the glass to his lips again.

…

'Boop.' Castiel said, leaning over the table and touching the tip of Dean's nose. Dean grinned and wrinkled his nose in return then swatted his hand away. They'd been drinking on and off, slow and steady for about two hours and the whiskey they'd kept on ordering was taking its toll.

'You're drunk.' Dean said, able to hold his alcohol better than Cas could. He was glad that Cas was a cute drunk, otherwise he would have been drving him home by now. Some people could get nasty when they had enough of a party going on in their stomach but it seemed to have a positive effect on Cas. He had perked up considerably. 

Dean was enjoying Cas' company more than he thought he would, worried he'd be solely depressed about the events of earlier that night. It's not that he didn't have a right to be, it's just that you can only hear a sob story for so long before it all gets a tiny bit tedious.

'Yeah I am.' Castiel replied gleefully. He played footsie with Dean under the table, who responded to him as he moved his feet, managing to tangle their legs together at one point in some drunken haze, at which Cas had to look under the table and physically pull his legs away from Dean's. They laughed at that until Cas turned solemn.

'I can't believe Henry is dead.' Cas shook his head, changing the subject entirely. Dean rolled his eyes. He had really hoped they wouldn't get onto the topic of Henry. Cas put his head into his crossed arms then looked up at Dean sadly, just his eyes and a little bit of his nose showing above them, his skin goosebumped all over. 'I forgot.' he muffled.

'Don't look at me like that Cas.' Dean said, clearing his throat, not knowing what to do to wipe the mournful expression off Castiel's face, ruffling his hand through Cas' hair in a manner he thought platonic, a gesture he hoped would convey that he cared just enough to worry about him. He didn't know what he was saying to himself. He didn't know the guy, he could've been a murderer or may have just escaped from a psychiatric ward, he wasn't going to be a permanent fixture in his life, so why was he getting attached. Why was he flirting with him and leading him on when he knew he'd never let anything come of it, and why didn't he have the control to stop it. He'd seen his fair share of victims and he'd formed no emotional attachments, so why was Castiel his exception. He blamed it on the drinking.

'You know what...I didn't need him, he needed me.' Castiel shouted, banging his fist on the table, snapping out of his depressed, philosophical phase. Dean looked around the bar to see if anyone had just heard Cas' outburst and would be looking at them with disdain but the only people left was them and an old guy who sat next to a jukebox that was stuck on the same song. He looked too absorbed in his own mind to notice Cas and Dean, and it didn't seem he cared anyway, but he was listening vaguely to everything they said, occasionally swearing at the jukebox and telling it to shut up as he banged the side of it. Some idiot had put money in it earlier and now it refused to be quiet.

'I'll bet he did.' Dean grinned lightly in return, having to physically force himself not to wink. He wondered if Cas could make good pie. 'Heterosexual thoughts.' he said internally. Was he always this flirty when he drank he asked himself. He didn't know, but he decided he'd already had too much. Apparently Cas had too as he sat giggling to himself, his laugh lighting up the room in some way, clearing the heavy air that hung around the bar with a playful breeze. Dean had no idea how he could go from down in the dumps all the way to his current gleeful state in a matter of seconds.

'What do you do Dean? Do you kill things? Seriously you can tell me.' Cas babbled, looking at Dean in adoration as his elbows sat on the table and his head cupped in his hands. He looked so young it hurt Dean's heart a little bit. He knew he'd had a lot of crap when he was younger but he was born into it. He deserved it somehow. Like Sammy said, they always knew they weren't pure when they were kids. Cas was just a victim in all of this, one that kept on suffering and would keep on suffering until Dean had got to the bottom of his attractiveness to demons. He'd ask Sam about their sessions.

'How old are you Cas?'

'I'm twenty one I think, I can't recall when my birthday is right now.' He furrowed his brow, his gestures exaggerated, closing his eyes as he tried to remember. 'Hey, you never answered my question! I'm old enough for you to tell me.' Cas said playfully, remembering the wrong thing. 'That song thingy is really annoying.' he commented as if he finally heard the music that had been playing on repeat for the past half hour. Dean knew it, Cas didn't.

'Jukebox Cas, it's called a jukebox, and I think you've had way too much to drink.' Dean said jokingly across the table, looking at all the empty glasses that hadn't been cleared away. Hilary was giving them space and she appreciated it. She'd only flirt with Cas anyway, and judging by his inebriated state he'd probably end up going home with her. 'I don't want you to regret it in the morning.'

''I never regret things I do when i'm drunk, one time I won a raffle.' Cas smiled to himself. He didn't want to go home anymore. He wanted to stay sat in the bar, talking to Dean forever. There was a picture of a boat on the wall.  
Dean stopped for a moment, trying to deduce whether Cas was being suggestive or was just a happy drunk and had no current mind filter.

'Oh yeah? What'd you win?' Dean asked, watching Cas as he looked at the painting, maybe seeing something in it that Dean couldn't. Cas turned to face him and looked confused for a moment. 'I don't remember.' he frowned 'It was a while ago, I sneaked into a place with my brother, I must have been eighteen.' He didn't realise how much of a bad influence Gabriel had been on him. In a way it was a good thing.. Castiel would always chose to stay home and read or play video games on his own rather than go out and raise hell. Gabriel made him brave though, the kind of brave that gets you put in the back of police cars with a pair of handcuffs keeping you from escaping, the brave that thought it was a good idea to light fireworks in an empty field and put on an unscheduled show for the town, and the brave that had fake made and went to bars underage. He still preferred to read though. Gabriel had established that Cas would follow him to the end of hell and back, and he was the perfect partner in crime because he looked so darn innocent.

They sat in a comfortable silence for long enough. Neither wanted to speak for fear of saying the wrong things and making anything awkward.

'Has anyone ever told you that you're cute Cas?'

'Maybe...I guess so.' Cas shrugged, making him more adorable in Dean's eyes. It was his eyes, Dean thought, it had to be. They way they glistened with hope but looked so defeated. He didn't know why that was beautiful. If anything it was sad but...still beautiful.

'Because you're really cute.' Dean coughed. He didn't know why he'd told Cas. It had just been at the front of his mind for a while now and Castiel was probably too drunk to remember it in the morning. 'I'm gonna take you home now, if you can remember the way.' He said softly, feeling like he'd sobered up enough to drive safely, and feeling slightly paternal too, a profound need to make sure Castiel got home safely and wasn't attacked again on the way. It made him wonder how many boyfriends Cas had had, and if they had all died.

'Okie dokie.'

'Okie dokie.' Dean repeated, taking Cas' hand and pulling him up. Cas still looked at the picture of the boat.

…

The house was eerie.

Cas arrived home with a groggy head. He had desperately tried not to fall asleep in Dean's car but he knew that he had a couple of times, startled awake by sharp turns or the sound of skidding on the road. Dean didn't do it on purpose, he was perfectly happy with a sleeping Cas in his front seat. It was the only time Castiel's face didn't look faintly scared. He just worried about waking him.

He had said thank you to Dean the best he could but he just wanted to collapse in bed. He thought maybe if he asked nicely Dean would tuck him up and ensure that he didn't die in the night. He watched from the window as 

Dean drove off in the Impala. A nice car really, it suited him. He wondered where he was going. During their little conversation Dean hadn't really said much about himself, or anything about himself. He liked to talk about Sam a lot though. He'd have to face his therapist knowing way too much about him. Cas got a bottle of water from the fridge and took it upstairs with him, putting it on the nightstand next to his bed and stripping down into his boxers. He knew his dreams were going to be messed up that night, aware he'd wake up in a cold sweat sometime in the dark.

He woke up to deafening whispers.

They said there would be something happening soon.   
…  
'You had a girlfriend?' Sam Winchester asked, doodling scratchy sigils on his notebook page. Old habits die hard. 

He was still desperately trying to keep away from the hunting life but it always managed to creep up on him. Dean didn't help when he'd come in every week for a 'session' in which he'd spend fifteen minutes talking about himself and then the rest of the time asking him about lore. Dean was fun to psychoanalyse but he didn't get to do it enough.

Cas nodded, rubbing his eyes and trying not to let on about how much his head hurt.

'Are you okay Cas?' Sam asked. He looked like a mess frankly, his hair unruly and his clothes un-ironed. He could pull it off if he didn't look like he was in so much pain. Sam wondered whether now was the time to start prescribing his own selection of pills. He hated to have to bring out the medication but when Castiel complained of hearing voices almost every session Sam thought it was for the best. He'd talk to Anna about it.

'I was out with your brother.' Cas sighed. He woke up hugging his pillow that morning, realising that it was probably time to find someone to sleep with. If he hadn't slept with anyone in a while he got attached to inanimate objects. That would mean drinking again though and going to another bar, and even then it was a risk to walk up to a guy and assume he way gay on a whim, only to be shot down. Gay bars were out of the question. He wasn't into the looks he got there, and he couldn't dance.

'Dean? Why were you out with Dean?' Sam pulled a face. 'Wait, it's none of my business.' He really wanted to know. 

Dean didn't just invite people for drinks, especially not men. Cas didn't seem the type to be interested in a guy like Dean...they were polar opposites.

'It's okay.' Cas smiled. He'd had fun. 'My old boyfriend died last night-killed by a black eye.' He had come to terms with Henry's death scarily fast. In fact he didn't even care anymore. Sam noted that down. Cas was beginning to think the black-eyed things were in his head. Too many late nights and working too hard at school and work.   
Henry wasn't really dead and neither were the others who had felt the black wrath. It was all in his mind. He desperately wanted to believe it but he knew he wasn't insane. These things existed on Earth and nobody was doing anything about it.

'And you're not upset?' Sam asked.

'I was for about five minutes. It's really odd, it's like I don't have the energy to care anymore.' Cas said softly, looking up into Sam's soothing eyes. Sometimes he liked to look at Sam's eyes.

'Sorry, you were talking about your girlfriend.' Sam continued. He was becoming increasingly more interested in Cas' tales of his past. There were links somewhere, he just couldn't see them yet, he needed Cas to carry on. So far it had only been the demon henchmen that had been getting to him, but when would the white eyes get involved.

Cas began;

It was when he was about seventeen. He remembered what Gabriel had said about him being bisexual and thought that maybe he was too. So he began to flirt with girls and Castiel, being quite clever and overall good looking in his teenage years didn't have too much trouble finding dates once it became apparent he was readily available. He thought maybe if he found the right girl then he wouldn't be gay anymore and it was just an awkward phase he was going through. He hoped. 

Her name was Amelia and she was good at math. She agreed to tutor him and they studied together sometimes, no big deal really, and Castiel liked her, but he couldn't shake that she was a mask for his denial. They dated for about four months, and every day Gabriel saw them together he hated Cas a bit more for denying who he was. 

They stopped talking after a while, and Gabriel would go on to ignore him until he decided who he really wanted to be., who he really was. Castiel was a faker and he hated it. 

She stayed over at the Novak house one night when it was too late for her to bother going home and Cas thought that it was going to be the night. They were young and didn't want to care. Besides, it wasn't like they hadn't done anything before. After the first night of their study sessions he'd walked her home and kissed her breezily on her porch, believing it to be the right thing to do at the time. She looked pretty and he felt bold. It went from there like a runaway train. 

They got on like a house on fire and Castiel thought it was love...as much love as seventeen year olds could possibly feel. 

And so they sat in his room being idle teens, occasionally reaching out to touch each other, but mainly content with just each others company. Castiel wasn't gay. He couldn't be, not with Amelia around. He thought he could be with her for the rest of his life. 

They settled down at about three in the morning, snaking his hands around her waist as the lay beneath his sheets. 'Cas.' she had breathed. They had expected this and she turned to face him, eyes sincere 'Tonight?' she asked calmly. They had both been ready. 'Only if you want to.' and she had nodded because she liked Castiel a lot. 

He had gone to the bathroom. When he came back she lay face down. 

'Was it the black eyed things?' Sam asked, interrupting Cas' story.

He nodded 'They got to her and she suffocated herself.'

Of course they all thought he had done it. He secluded himself and he let the voices in again.


	4. Maybe it's okay to like both guys and girls

The doorbell.

Its shrill cry woke Cas up from his afternoon nap. It was okay. He'd been sleeping for too long anyway. It'd give him a headache if he stayed in bed any longer. He contemplated taking the medication Sam had offered. He had it all in the kitchen cupboard, shoved right at the back, hidden behind some cereal boxes, waiting for him to ingest. He didn't want to give into them, not yet anyway, as it felt like that was him giving up. If he had to do this whole 'troubled soul' thing he wanted to do it properly. As soon as he got the plastic bottles home he researched their side effects; headaches, drowsiness, palpitations, haemophilia and nausea. That was no good, why cure one thing to only suffer from a million other slightly less but still irritating things.

He stretched and wiped the sleep from his eyes. There weren't many people left to visit him, most of them were dead after all. It was probably just someone trying to sell him something that he didn't want or somebody preaching about a religion he didn't care for, and he wouldn't have the heart to turn them away so he'd stand at the door and listen to their cause for half an hour. Empathy is a bitch. With bleary eyes he searched for his glasses, finding grasp on them as they sat on the nightstand, the world becoming a clearer place as he slipped them up his nose. He hurried down the stairs and to the door, trying to fit a person to the black figure behind translucent glass, unable to tell who it was.

It was Dean.

Cas stood behind the door, trying to not let on that he was just in his boxers. The summers were hot, sweaty in the afternoon as the sun blazed through into his bedroom, making sleep come easier, and Cas liked to sleep with something over him. If he wore anything other than boxers he'd overheat, besides, there wasn't meant to be anyone there to see him with little on. He didn't make a habit of people seeing him naked.

He hid, head and a bit of the top half of him showing from behind the door. He figured Dean could probably tell, but he could at least be modest about it and not thrust his form into Dean's face. He hoped Dean didn't think he always paraded around without clothes on.

'Cas.' Dean smiled, silently asking if he could come in. Cas didn't know what to do. Dean was good company and he made him laugh and feel better about everything that was wrong in his life, a new found anchor along with his brother Sam, but he couldn't come in. Not with Castiel looking the way he did. Unshaven and half naked and stained with sweat. He turned his face away from Dean, looking into the house. Dean glanced at his unmarked neck, then his bare clavicles. He looked away.

'Can you come back in twenty minutes or something...or I guess you could come in and watch t.v, I just need to have a shower and get dressed and then...' Cas stopped babbling long enough for Dean to pat his shoulder briefly and fish his car keys out of his pocket. He laughed lightly at Cas, even more so when he began to blush.

'I'll go to the store and pick up some beers, we gotta talk.' He turned and went back to his car, slinking away like he never even came, the only trace of him the faint gasoline smell that lingered behind him. The Impala looked strange in this suburban nightmare, notes of rock and roll inside the sheet music to a picket fence musical. If his life was a musical then Castiel waited in the wings. He shook his head as Dean pulled away. There was a quiet fascination towards him and he didn't know why. Or he thought he didn't, but he knew it had something to do with the mystery behind him. He also liked the idea that Dean was his knight that saved him when he needed to be saved.

Sitting in the car, outside the store, Dean pictured Cas in his mind. He was fallen somehow, missing a piece of him as he sat inside Dean's head.

He lay back against the seat, emerging himself into his imagination.

Him and Cas in a grey scale forest, sitting on the ground around a flame, scoring the ground with their blunted fingers, just the two of them. Something watched them from the shadows though. Dean could see its yellow eyes as they glinted sharp in the fire. Flickered tones of a hushed fear. Cas laughed inside his head, unaware of the things that looked on, genuinely happy for once, walking away from him after a little while and going towards a lake where he stripped his clothes off roughly as he went, a fabric trail for Dean to follow. He picked up the items as he went; glasses, watch, shoes, shirt. Castiel couldn't be seen, the only trace of him the things he shed. Glimpses of a pale arm or the heel of a foot disappearing behind trees. When Dean found him we has already submerging himself, stopping when he saw Dean and inviting him to join, a wet hand pulling on his leg to come swim, forcing him down when he said no.

Dean opened his eyes and got out of the car deciding he should get more sleep. No good comes of an imagination like that.

Cas showered with cool water, taking much time to do so, letting the water down his every rounded curve as stood below the stream of cold to chill his sleep heated body, thinking about what he and Dean could possibly have to talk about. He realised the time he was taking and hurriedly shampoo'd his hair, the fallen water making his eyes sting. At least he'd smell good when Dean got back.

He wanted to change into something old and comfy but decided he'd better make some kind of effort, opting for a big grey sweater to warm his now chilled body and a pair of black jeans that he wasn't sure why he owned. They looked good but they didn't feel very him. He went back to the bathroom and shaved, not cleanly, just so he didn't look so derelict and weather beaten, and then he waited in the silenced home for Dean to come back.

What if he didn't? He could've forgotten or found something better to do. Cas wouldn't be surprised if Dean ditched him for someone more interesting, but he heard the hard raps on the door clear as day as if it were a tune, and he almost persuaded himself it was a travelling salesman that time, but not quite. He knew it was Dean.

He invited him in and cleared his books from the sofa, putting them on the floor next to Dean's feet, who looked amusedly at them, like it was strange for someone to read such things for fun or for school. Sam had some like that, thick tome like blocks. He would bring them with him when he had holidays and had to come back home, and he would ignore the world completely when he read them, whether he could hear people or not, escapism in its rawest form.

He wondered if Cas would rather read a book than be in his company. From investigating the spines he guessed Cas studied history; ancient Greece and Rome, and Latin.

He thought about asking Castiel what he was actually saying when he used exorcising rituals, but that would entail letting him in on the big hunter secret. People weren't meant to know that demons really existed. They existed in stories and nowhere else. But where did people think the stories came from? The demons success was based on naivety. But they told some people didn't they...they'd told plenty in the past and they turned out just fine.

There was something about Castiel that wasn't right to Dean though. He was attracting the things like ants to sugar water-they obviously needed him for something, and so wherever he was, there'd be demons. Castiel was a demon magnet and Dean could use him to find them all out, send them all back to hell. He could find out why they wanted him. What made him so special?

As much as Dean hated the idea of introducing someone into the world of hunting, he wanted Cas to be his partner, the bait for hungry demons and himself the final trap, ready around the corner with the spray painted devil's traps, iron and exorcising rituals.

They could take on evil together, carry on with the family business, save people.

He got lonely working by himself all the time, nobody to tell him right from wrong or mock his music taste, not a soul to question where he went the night before and judge him for eating so much junk. Cas could probably do that, he could impersonate FBI and Dean could teach him how to handle a gun and how to decapitate a vampire. He was rushing but there was no other way to go. He wanted this for some reason he couldn't put his finger on.

Castiel was already broken, why bother fixing him when it could all be used for good-no point in fixing a vase when it was just going to be dropped again- it wasn't like more people wouldn't die...well, it looked like the demons were after him now after eliminating all of his weaknesses. Dean would vow to protect him and poor little Castiel wouldn't feel guilty after a kill, he'd feel justified. Killing the things that killed his. He'd become ruthless, a useful asset in finding the thing that killed Mary. He'd never be Sam, but he'd come close enough. It was about time he started hunting with somebody again and Castiel happened to come along at the right time.

He was shy, reserved and nervous but there was an ominous presence of something powerful.

Dean felt awful. He was to tamper with an innocent life. A life already made unpure.

Dean wanted it for nobody but himself.

'You wanted to talk?' Cas questioned, handing Dean a cup of coffee and sitting next to him on the sofa, a safe distance away so he wouldn't come across as being too friendly.

'I want to tell you the truth.'

Would Cas notice if he slipped an extra something into his coffee. The flask was in his jacket pocket. Lacing things with alcohol didn't actually count as drinking in his books.

Cas looked to the side, unaware that Dean was ever not telling the truth.

Dean didn't want to see his eyes, they were too wide and wrong in every way. His body language became drawn and where it once faced Dean it now faced the wall. Dean knew he shouldnt be asking for any of the things he wanted.

'Truth about what?' Cas cradled his hot cup of tea and blew on the top in a way he though nonchalant. His t.v was on in the background, a dull murmur of the news that didn't allow the room to go too silent. The truth was a such a silly thing. Why bother with it when it was such a rare commodity these days. Cas didn't tell it. Neither did Dean. Few really did and even then it would likely be traced with the untruths of those before. The world they lived in was fiction.

'Me, what I do...how I knew that Henry was possessed.'

Dean talked for more than an hour and the things he said made Cas feel sad.

...

'You want me to help you hunt these things, rather than let them hunt me?' Cas said calmly, popping the top off his beer. He didn't want to. He'd rather die. He'd been avoiding...running from these things his whole life, why would he go out and chase them, the ultimate fate for them to bring him down faster than they would have if he kept on running. Dean said he could save people, do the world a favour. Castiel owed the world nothing though. The world owed him. He was owed a life that he never got to have; supportive parents, a scholarship, a life where nobody around him died due to suspicious circumstances. To die a noble death was no great comfort. Dean might have thought himself a hero but in Cas' eyes it was all a tiny bit crazy. He wanted to teach at the university as soon as he was qualified enough, not fight evil as a day job. He thought Dean was stupid for giving up a normal life to go risk his own.

Demons chased him.

It was too exciting.

Why him? He was nothing special. He knew he was anxious and afraid...he'd be no help in any way, shape or form. If he saw a monster he'd run. Who would choose to fight face on?

Idiots like Dean Winchester apparently. Stupid guys with pretty faces but no brains to match.

Dean nodded enthusiastically from across the couch. He looked at Cas' face for a sign of something. He was a blank canvas. Dean wanted him to paint on a smile for his sake. Cas brought his knees up onto the sofa and rearranged himself to face Dean front on. He had found a something in him that he didn't think existed during Dean's talk. He now knew that Dean was lonely and afraid and he would die trying to prove otherwise.

'No.' he said simply, then he smiled and took a sip of beer. Dean watched the way it wetted his smug, slightly parted lips. He sat more confidently now, his back straight as he stared Dean down. He couldn't just turn up at his house uninvited and expect Cas to drop everything for him. He didn't even know him, not really. Castiel knew that if he got into this it wouldn't just be demons that they'd destroy, going by what Dean had said there'd be vampires and shapeshifters and God knows what else. He wasn't quick or clever, he couldn't use a gun and he'd hold Dean back. He'd be bait and he'd be eaten. The only thing he might be remotely good at would be lore.

Dean was great, he wanted to get to know him and be his friend, but not like this, not stuck in the front of the Impala for hours on end until he contemplated killing him, holed up the same motels that dotted the highway and stuck in the same little towns, saving people that didn't even deserve it. So no. He didn't want to hunt.

'What do you mean no?' Dean moved closer to Cas, unaware he was doing so, and Cas did the same, slowing breaking the respectful distance between them without knowing it. Cas saying no was wrong and it drove Dean crazy. Cas should do what he was told and not try to break the rules. Disobedience didn't suit him. This wasn't him. He was asking the guy he met and drank with at the bar, not the Castiel he sat with today.

'Just no...you haven't even tried to persuade me in the slightest...you don't sell yourself well.' Castiel shrugged slightly, pulling his long sweater sleeves into the hollow of his hands so just his fingers creeped over the edges. He rested his elbows on his crossed knees. 'I'm not going to drop everything for you Dean.' he said that more timidly, as if he had found himself once more. It was easier to say if he could hide behind something.

Dean liked the way Castiel said his name. Liked that he remembered his name. Sometimes people didn't.

From what Dean had heard there wasn't much for Cas to leave behind. He had a year left of college...Dean could wait a year for him easily. In the meantime he could visit and teach him the things he'd need to know. He could hunt on his own for a little while longer, or he could rent a flat for a year and settle in, get a job like Sammy thought he should. But he didn't want to. Hunting was all he knew. An office job would be torture and he wasn't the sort to settle. He'd tried and it almost killed him.

They sat apart.

'How can I make you think it's a good idea?' Dean asked, a grin beginning to play on his trusting face. He tilted his head at Cas coyly. He wasn't going to let his time be wasted.

'You can't...just at least give me some time to think about it all.'

And that meant no.

Cas sipped his beer again and turned his attention to the t.v, changing channels to watch an old Doctor Who episode, all attention turned away from Dean. He didn't understand it himself. When he first saw Dean he thought he had a face he'd be able to stare at for hours, memorising his every curve and crevice, yet he found it so easy to look away. Because he knew that when he looked back Dean wouldn't be gone. If he became friends with Dean he might not die, he'd fend off the demons that chased him. Dean could be the one to save him. He still didn't want to hunt but he could keep Dean clinging on with the hope that he'd change his mind. It might be nice to be in control.

'Castiel?' Dean asked, watching Cas' profile.

Cas turned to face him, his expression changing.

'How many have died?' He didn't want to ask but he felt like he had to. He wanted an idea of how screwed up Cas was. The more the better. He realised how sad it seemed that he hoped a man to be in pain for his own benefit but he supposed it was how he could get things done. He wanted Castiel's rage for himself.

'Nine...would you excuse me.' Cas stood up from the sofa and walked to the kitchen. He stood on his tiptoes to reach the highest shelf of the cupboard, pushing aside the boxes and finding the pills. He braced himself against the sink as he swallowed them for the first time in a long time. A cocktail of crazy entering his body. He didn't truly know why but he guessed that he only took them because he wanted to see what would happen and because he felt sad. Dean didn't want him, he wanted the voices in his head and he wanted the mystery that surrounded him. At least if he collapsed or had any other side effects then Dean was there to phone for an ambulance.

Dean was there...Cas could sense him standing in the doorway.

'Who came before Henry?' Dean knew he shouldn't be digging away at a grave he knew he wouldn't be able to fill back up again but he was curious. Why was Cas broken? Why did he take pills?

Sam had told him about Harry, and about Amelia and he felt wrong when he visited Sam after Castiel's sessions, trying to avoid him in the waiting room as he came out. He wanted to know everything about Cas though, and if it meant breaking confidentiality then he was all up for it. If it was anyone else he wouldn't. Cas was his exception.

'My mother.' Cas said almost inaudibly, thinking about repeating himself in case Dean didn't hear him first time. He grasped at the sides of the sink, tightening his grip to steady himself. He still wasn't over it. It hurt.

His own mother, the one who kissed him goodnight even when he got too old for it to still be cute. He still let her kiss him because he knew it meant something and knew it wouldn't be long before she went away too like all the others, it all just a matter of time before her eyes went black and his momentarily perfect little world would crumble up again. A hug and kiss a day wouldn't keep the monsters away. His mom who told him stories about the Titanic before he went to bed and helped him trace back their family history to see if they were related to anyone who traveled on it, fueled his passion for boats and took him on trips even though she got seasick. The one who went to see the film with him and who comforted him when he cried about Jack and sang 'My heart will go on' with him in the car on the journey back home. The same woman who encouraged him to do history when the rest of the family went into veterinary work despite his fathers reservations and disapproval. She told him it didn't matter and that she'd be proud no matter what he did with his life. He was the youngest of the three and her baby, who cuddled up with her when she was sick and stood up for her when he got old enough to fight back. She was the one who pursed her lips and became irate when he acted recklessly and came home with cuts and bruises. A mother's love taken away. His only saving grace was that he got as much time as he did. She got to see him graduate and saw him through his first years of university. It still didn't seem very fair though. He was grateful for Gabriel, the one who stayed strong throughout and arranged the funeral, who sorted out the will and checked up on Cas every day to see how he was doing. It was a year of fake smiles and holding on.

'Mine too.' Dean leaned against the door frame with him arms crossed. It seemed mother's died too early a lot of the time. He and Cas had finally found some common ground. 'It's hard.' They both had to grow up too quickly, matured minds way past their actual age and forced to obtain a fierce independence that grew with them in different ways.

Cas nodded, Dean watching the nape of his neck as he did so.

Dean didn't know what compelled him to do so but he walked to Cas and grabbed his shoulder, forcing his body to face him and stop shying away for once. He was stupid for always being so diffident. Cas was so stupid and cute and not very wrong at .

'If you won't hunt for me, then hunt for your mom.' he stated, staring into Cas' eyes, capturing the foamy blue sadness they possessed.

He tilted his head and Dean saw the corners of his mouth turn down slowly, his face distorting into an unexpected snarl. Cas pushed him away roughly, a lot of force stored up in his seemingly little body. He looked down at himself then back to Dean. He didn't know he was capable of ever pushing someone.

If this was what Castiel could hide then Dean definitely wanted to go hunting with him, irrational spurts of anger or not.

'What's your fucking problem?' he shouted, Dean stepping back into the counter, letting Cas cast him aside. 'You don't bring my mom into this.' he fumed a flush reaching his skin.

Something was flaring inside Cas, a holy fire burning away at his insides, melting every piece of him until it wasn't really him at all, just a liquid mess.

Dean had no right to use his mom as some kind of twisted bargaining chip. He thought they had something in common because both their mothers were dead? They had nothing. Dean was a nobody, a speck of dust in Castiel's life. An egotistical, selfish bastard who only cared about his own gain. 'Just go, I don't want to see your stupid face.'

He was going to punch him if Dean didn't go and he knew it would be a move he'd regret. His face was obnoxious and he hated everything about him. He should go be an Abercrombie & Fitch model with his stupid sun kissed skin and chiselled jaw. They shouldn't even be in the same room because they were leagues apart and nothing could change that, absent mothers or not.

Dean moved towards Castiel, who flinched and backed away, reigniting his flame from just glancing at Dean's face. 'You couldn't save her Cas.'

Dean didn't understand. Why hunt other than for vengeance, he had reason to, most hunters did. Family members taken by the unholy. An unstoppable desire to put things right. It could make Cas right. He'd treat him so good on the road, he'd make sure he was fed and got enough sleep, throw away his medication. He would give Castiel anything he wanted just to be involved in his little world. He just wanted to hunt nowadays. There was nothing else left for him to do anymore.

'Don't you dare bring my mom into this.' Castiel spat, trying to get as far away from Dean as possible inside the small kitchen. 'I told you.'

Dean could see the fear, the anger, the hate inside Castiel. The way he projected himself into something else when he let the emotions out where he was so much darker and scarier even because Dean knew that if he really wanted to he could get nasty. The way his cheeks tinted pinker and his lips the same, how his hands shook and he let his hair flop forward from its usual uniform messy form. It made him angry too, frustrated. Castiel didn't get to be mad at him. It wasn't meant to be. He was meant to say yes when Dean offered him a chance at a different life and they were meant to drive off into the sunset. He should be grateful.

'You think you're so special because you're the only one who ever lost something?' He spat at Castiel 'It's pathetic, I've lost more people than I can count because I couldn't save them...people I loved and you're the only one who gets to be sad?'

'You're not the hero you think you are Dean, I bet you create more chaos than you solve.'

That stung him more than it thought it would. He tried. Castiel had to see that he tried...

'I'd rather be this than fucking insane like you are.'

Cas pushed him against the wall, getting close and personal, his face pressed to Dean's so their noses almost touched. 'I'm not insane.' he said through gritted teeth.

Dean regretted his words then, but he flipped himself over so it was Cas who's back faced the wall. He had to be in control. Besides Cas was shorter.

'You called me cute last time I saw you.' he snarled, looking at Dean with disgust. 'You won't think I'm cute...'

As they stood inches apart the kitchen was hot, burning white. Cas' ears rung and his head pounded. 'I don't think you're cute.' he bit back with a growl springing forward.

He grabbed the front of Castiel's sweater and pulled him closer, bunching it up in a fist, the material soft and warm in his hands. He put his forehead to Cas', never losing his contact with Castiel's confused, defiant eyes, both of their breaths heavy in the confined space they'd created, anger still burning through both their veins. The room was clouded and neither could see. 'Do you still want me to go?' he said roughly, his voice gravel. Cas looked down. He didn't know what he wanted. 'Do you?' Dean repeated, pressing into Cas.

'No.' he whispered sharply into Dean's lips, the latter catching his words and holding them. He didn't want Dean to go anymore.

'Good.' Dean pressed his lips harshly to Castiel's, both of them stumbling back hard into the wall, Cas' back colliding with it but not feeling a thing as they moved, Cas' hand finding Dean's in the moment and linking his fingers around Dean's. He pushed back against Dean harder, wanting to consume him, sucking hard on his bottom lip, earning a loud moan, a tight squeeze around his hand so it hurt until he let go and wrapped his arms around Dean's neck, never close enough to really feel him. They were still so angry and it showed. Dean's lips left his, a harsh smacking sound, and traveled. He pecked Cas' cheekbones with force and moved down to his jawline leaving a line of kisses pressed firmly into his skin so they lasted, down further towards his neck, Castiel lifting his head to accommodate Dean's scowling mouth which wanted to bite. He slid slightly down the wall, his knees weak as Dean sucked on his neck, tearing down the top of his sweater to touch his collar bones. Cas grabbed at Dean's hands and looped them tight around his waist where Dean rubbed the skin of his hips, sweater riding up as Cas pushed his hips forward. Cas ducked and caught Dean's lips again, guiding him into lifting his head, silently asking for him to open his mouth. He didn't oblige to the demand, pulling back after a single dirty kiss on the side of Cas' mouth. Cas groaned in disapproval and pulled back too, sliding back into the wall in hopes of steadying his rapid heartbeat and the pounding in his head, to try to calm his ragged breaths. He looked at Dean from under his eyelashes, trying to feel the fury. Dean was savage.

'Fuck.' Dean panted, one hand still curled around Castiel's exposed hip. He wasn't frustrated anymore.

He looked at what he'd done; Cas' messed up hair and the little red marks that littered his neck, the way his lips had gone raw and red and plump. He looked insanely hot and it burned Dean to think he'd been the creator of such a mess.

Dean pushed Castiel's hair out of his face lightly, just because he thought he should and was greeted with a worn out sigh from Cas who went to open his mouth to say something but was quietened before anything could leave. 'Your mom became a part of it a long time ago Cas...all the people you loved...I'm sorry.' he soothed, trying to calm him down the best he could, continually, rhythmically stroking and pushing his hands through Cas' hair ruined hair. It was still damp in places. He knew he should stop touching Cas but he didn't want to.

'You're making me so angry Dean.' Cas said quietly, exhausted from the unexpected outburst even though he wanted more. He didn't have the energy to move Dean's hands away even if he wanted to.

'I know baby, I know.'

Cas flicked his eyes up into Dean's.

Dean realised his mistake and bit his lip quickly. It was a habit. A really stupid habit, a reckless one too. Cas was a guy and he only called the Impala and girls baby. Guys shouldn't. It felt like the right thing to say.

Cas wasn't like most guys.

…

It was just a kiss Dean told himself whenever he looked at Cas as he sat on the couch, hugging a cushion to his chest as they watched tv. He was angry at the time and it was just a kiss. A way for both of them to let it out. All the angst and frustration and because Dean wanted to try something new.

They sat on opposite ends again but sometimes they accidentally touched toes and it sent little shivers down both of their backs.

He knew it wasn't just a kiss, and he tried to ignore the voice in his head that told him he liked it and should do it again. He wasn't gay...Cas was just an exception to that rule. It also happened that at the time Cas looked extremely kissable with all his pent up anger coming out and he didn't think...

'How can you afford to live here if you're a student?' Dean asked, not sure if Cas was paying attention to him anymore. It would be so easy for him to lean forward and kiss him again, softly this time, letting it linger on his skin. There was just something about Castiel that drove him slowly but surely insane. It could have been the way his hair looked like he'd just had sex or how he parted his lips subconsciously, the air of obliviousness that followed him and made him see the things Dean couldn't and how he sometimes didn't understand the things that should have been hard wired into him a long time ago.

'How did you know that?' Cas didn't look away from the screen, smiling sweetly to himself as he watched Dean writhe from the corner of his eye. Dean had kissed him, hot and heavy and now he was feeling the aftermath where as Cas didn't really feel anything. He'd been kissed plenty of times.

'Sammy mentioned it, I remembered.' Dean said almost proudly. 'You're so young.' Cas finally turned to him, Dean's shining eyes making him happy. He felt just so happy and he hated that Dean made it so. It would make it harder to let go when the time came.

He tilted his head. 'You and Sam talk about me?' he questioned, briefly sticking out his bottom lip. Everything he told Sam he told in confidentiality. But him being a student was hardly a secret that he had trusted Sam to keep. He didn't want Dean to know about how wrong he really was. Of course he knew something wasn't quite right, he'd seen him ingest a selection of pills earlier and he'd witnessed his car park antics but he couldn't know the full extent of it; the white noises and the talk of Dean Winchester by names he didn't know but names he was familiar with.

'Sam said you're one of his favourite people, he thinks you're interesting.'

'Is interesting another word for crazy?' Cas asked, picking thread from the cushion, the antlers from the little stag that was sewed into it. He was aware of Dean's eyes upon him and it burned. He wasn't crazy, he just wasn't quite himself.

He went to the window and looked at the sky. It was red tonight, soon to be swallowed by a vast blackness. The moon was a piece of crumbling bone and the sky blood. He stared for a while until it began fade to pink and then to nothing, little lights flicking on in the vastness of it and Cas realised how small he really was, wrapping his arms around himself and sitting back down, closer to Dean this time. He wanted to lean against him and be for a little while because it all seemed so perfect but he didn't know how Dean felt about him and he didn't want to come across as easy. A kiss meant nothing, it was just Dean's way of telling him to stop talking. To do it again would be...reckless. But would be so easy to fit himself under Dean's neck and curl up with him, to lift his head and place sneaky kisses on his jaw. There was a difference between a sweet, sincere kiss and an angry, aroused one though.

'I don't think you're crazy...I wasn't thinking back there, I just said everything to upset you.'

'You don't?' Cas looked at the floor with a puzzled look. Everyone else did and he didn't mind it. There was something wrong with him and he accepted it. Most caterpillars grew into butterflies sooner or later, he just had a broken wing and no butterfly friends help him fly, only moths who didn't understand why he traveled so close to the ground. Dean could be a butterfly.

Dean shook his head and stroked his hand through Cas' hair, breaking their unspoken boundaries 'I think you're cute.'

This was wrong.

'Would you wait for me Dean?' he asked quietly, building up more confidence as he went along. 'One year, I'll get better for you.' Cas needed to touch Dean, show him that he was human. He needed Dean to know that this was all for him. If Dean would let him he would give it all up for him. 'Don't get yourself in trouble for a while, not until I can be there to get you out of it.' he spoke, picking up his pace, unable to stop himself now 'And don't get hurt because I don't know what i'd do if you weren't there in a year's time...it's stupid I know but just promise you won't go.' He was calmed by Dean's arms wrapping around his waist and pulling him into his lap so his head would rest on his chest. One steamy kiss in a kitchen was all it took for Castiel. The gestures that followed then assured him. He was falling...he had fallen.He didn't want to act like he didn't want Dean anymore.

'I can't promise that Cas.' He felt so fragile in his grasp, so feathery that he could drift away if he forgot to hold on tight enough. Castiel hung his head, putting his face into Dean's shirt as the latter kissed the top of his head and told him it was okay.

He thought that maybe Dean liked him enough, thought he would stay for him.

Sentimental fool. It wasn't like sweet little kisses meant anything after all. Of course Dean wouldn't wait. He had his own life, he'd travel from place to place trying to save people's lives while Cas studied and got ready to accept his degree. He'd fight demons while Cas finished his course of therapy, and he'd never settle down when it was all Cas wanted to do. Cas would be lucky if Dean visited him even once a month. Even then he knew it would be difficult and they'd have nothing in common anymore, eventually leading to a drift in whatever they had. They would see each other around sometimes if they were ever in the same town and they wouldn't remember a thing.

He put his head in Dean's chest for the rest of the night while Dean lingered his hands all over Cas and tried not to fall asleep as he listened to the rapid beating of his heart, trying not to notice that it picked up every time he kissed him. Dean stared at Cas, unable to take his eyes off him for more than seconds at a time. He had to make sure he was still there, like he could slip away when he wasn't looking. He wasn't sure why he felt so protective over Cas, most likely because he felt that Castiel deserved to be looked after after all the shit he'd been put through. Hell, he would've given anything for something like this when he was Cas' age...except not with a guy, but if Cas swung that way then who was he to stop it. If Cas was cute who was he to stop himself?

'I'm not actually gay.' Dean mumbled into Cas' hair. Cas lifted his head and looked at him contently.

'That's okay.' He didn't want any other man to have him anyway. There was the slight problem of women but he could work around that. 'But what's this?'

Dean shrugged his shoulders 'I don't have a choice when it comes to this...you just feel right.'

Dean was silent for a minute before tilting his head up and kissing Castiel's actual lips instead of all the other places he found pleasure in touching; his hands, his neck, shoulders, hair, anywhere but his mouth. It only lasted a second, a sweet little meeting of their lips, just wanting to feel an actual response to his contact apart from the feel of Cas smiling into his chest.

'Cas?'

Cas made a noise of registration.

'If I was gay though...would you let me fuck you?' Dean asked, catching Cas off guard. Kissing was one thing but sex was a whole different story. To feel exposed and have to put his complete trust in a man he'd known for two weeks maximum. 'Because I would.'

'You're not my type.' Cas replied airily, gasping as Dean playfully nipped his neck in disagreement, turning it into a kiss by means of apology and lightly sucking the already pinkened skin. Dean didn't know what was happening to him, putting it down to sexual frustration as he ran his hands along Cas' body. He wanted to make Cas feel good and that in return would give him all the satisfaction in the world. When did Dean Winchester get to be so considerate?

Hr grabbed Cas' hips and brought them forward. 'Tell me I'm your type Cas, tell me we'd be good together.'

Castiel squirmed in his grip, resting his forehead on Dean's and touching him lightly on the lips. 'You're not my type.' Cas repeated, rolling his hips forward, grazing Dean's crotch and making him momentarily weak with his brief contact. Dean smirked, Cas was playing a game he could never win. He'd indulge him though. Of course Dean was his type, no other type would be right for him. Some called it destiny and others may call it plain good luck but Castiel and Dean worked together perfectly.

'C'mon baby, I am now, you've changed it.' He bit Castiel's bottom lip. He wanted to hear him say it so badly even though he persuaded himself he was fine without. Wanted the words to come from Castiel's mouth that he needed him, then it would be legitimate. He wouldn't be doing this because he had a stupid crush on someone who wasn't a female, but because Castiel needed him and wanted him.

Cas pulled back from Dean's affection, seemingly tired of it all, tucking himself back under Dean's chin, reaching his hand up to stroke his scratchy, stubble covered cheek.

It wasn't fair. He couldn't get Dean all riled up and expect him to just take it. Castiel was frustrating and he did it on purpose, keeping Dean on tenterhooks, that way it would be harder for him to go.

'Do you want to stay the night, sleep on the couch?' Cas asked, muffling a yawn. He didn't want Dean to know how exhausted he felt wrapped in his arms. He could drift off right there and then with sheer complacency. That would mean the night would end and in the morning he'd be gone. He didn't trust Dean not to sneak off. The night was all either of them had.

'I'd rather sleep next to you.'Dean admitted, half just flirting, half serious.

It'd been a while since he had someone laying next to him in bed, and even then it was probably just the aftermath of meaningless sex. He wondered whether he was trying to go too fast with Castiel. He responded to him nicely but why rush. He had all the time in the world.

He felt bad that he couldn't promise Cas that he'd always be there but he couldn't bring himself to say it when he knew he'd break it soon as the words left his mouth. He was a hunter. He hunted. The way that you couldn't take someone who worked in IT and expect them to suddenly start a daycare business when all they really knew was computers. In the same way you couldn't expect Dean to get a proper job. All Dean knew was killing things and he was good at it too. Just because he didn't promise him it didn't mean he wasn't going to visit, and he was going to think about Cas in all the time that he was hunting. Then he'd sleep next to him, not yet though.

'Cas, what happened to your mom?'

Castiel didn't answer, he'd fallen away into slumber. Dean still held on to him, not caring for the deadness it created in his body. He watched Cas' sleeping body, trying not to move an inch for fear of waking him. He shouldn't do that. Look at a man with desire and concern and lust, be protective and anxious, feel so good in his company. He was an angel, metaphorically speaking, and although it seemed like something Sam would say; too precious for this world. Dean didn't care if he was 'broken'. Broken was perfect.

Cas didn't stir until Dean's phone rang. He looked up at Dean with embarrassment. 'I'm so sorry I fell asleep.' he blushed, not very sorry at all. If anything it was Dean's fault for keeping him up. He tried to ignore that he had work in the morning and a paper due in a couple of days time. He might have to fall back on Becky again for help, and she'd sigh at him and say that he had to take more control of his life and plan his days out better. Even if he had written a schedule for the day ahead it wouldn't have involved Dean, so it would have to be scrapped. spontaneity was good. It kept him on his toes. He couldn't see Dean for a couple of days though; he needed to get things done. School was more important that a flimsy romance. He imagined bringing Dean onto campus, rushing to see him in his free periods and texting him in lectures. He was acting like a giddy school girl.

He was puzzled as to why Dean wasn't answering his cell that had rung twice now.

'It's okay, I'll phone them back.' he yawned, deciding it would be okay to sleep on the sofa after all. Cas didn't want to get too close. That was fine. He was glad that Cas was a challenge, that he wasn't easy. But maybe if he'd tried harder they'd both be in Castiel's bed by now. Sex was sex, he didn't care if it was with a guy...well, with Cas anyway.

Dean told Cas of his intentions to sleep downstairs that night, who sleepily went upstairs and got some blankets before kissing Dean's forehead and retiring to his own bed. He wished he hadn't asked Dean to sleep on the couch, it seemed so fabricated. He sat in bed and worried. It didn't seem right to get so familiar and then leave him downstairs, and he probably should have made him a drink, and kissed him somewhere other than the forehead because it seemed so paternal. He didn't stop worrying until he drifted off.

Four hours.

Dean woke up with a stiff neck and made his way to Cas' kitchen, doubting he'd really mind if he made himself some coffee. He phoned Bobby back after Cas went to bed, accepting the hunting job he was offered straight away. Anything to take his mind of Cas. It was unhealthy.

Hunting was an escape route, a place where he had to use all his instincts, take risks and make incisive decisions. Thinking about Castiel would get him killed and he was really trying not to die for Cas' sake. Besides it would be nice to see some different scenery. He hadn't had a kill since two weeks back, a vetala nest with a couple of hunters who saved his skin out there. That was the point though, the thrill of being so close to death that if he squinted he could see the shadow of a reaper. As much as he said he hated it, Dean lived for hunting and not even Cas could ever change that. Death would be his bitch until he finally caught up and caught him from behind.

He went up to check if Cas was okay, poking his head around doors until he found the right one. It wasn't right for Cas to live in a house with so many empty rooms.

He lay small in the double bed, the whole duvet wrapped around him, cocooning him in entirely. It would be so easy to slip in next to him, unravel him from his shell and hold him until he held on back. Fuck hunting.

He didn't though, he simply kissed Cas on the forehead, same as Cas had done to him, and went on his way, remembering to leave a note.

Dean phoned Sam as he sat in the Impala outside Castiel's house, finger hovering over his name, unsure of what to do.

'Sammy, talk me out of doing something stupid.' he laughed sadly to himself, checking his appearance in the rear view mirror, smoothing down his ruffled hair so he didn't look like one of the best had been a rough night. He kept thinking that if he looked at Cas' window the curtains would open for him and Cas would frown and wonder where he was going and why he left without so much as a goodbye. He pressed the call button.

Sam answered his phone almost immediately, surprising Dean that he was awake so early, barely giving him any time to prepare himself as he had planned to do.

'I gotta come see you.' Dean said, already beginning to drive to Sam's place. It wasn't far from Cas', they both chose to live in flimsy little areas.

Sam didn't question it, instead making a pot of coffee and getting himself out of the psychiatrist mind set. If he analysed him, Dean would get mad and refuse to speak to him and bottle up his feelings even more than he did on most days at the clinic. He hated the word clinic. Clinic meant patients and he didn't help patients, he helped clients.

Dean arrived in a fluster, barging in when Sam opened the door and making his way to the living room. Sam was another person who had too many empty rooms, some with just odd piles of books in them. Sam rolled his eyes at his melodramatic brother and followed him. He looked bad, worse than usual and Sam didn't know whether to be glad that his brother was paying him a visit or worried for the the exact same reason.

'What is it?' Sam asked at the doorway, watching Dean spread himself out on the couch. He shot a disapproving look at Dean's feet which rested boot clad on his furniture. Dean sighed loudly and fidgeted on the sofa. 'I've done something so stupid.'

'You gonna tell me what you did?' Sam asked, knowing that chances were that Dean wouldn't.

'No, I can't.'

Sam shoved Dean to make a space for him to sit. 'Well what am I meant to do then?' Sam liked to think he was the voice of reason in Dean's life. Who else would be?

Dean pulled a face.

'It's so wrong, but I want it to be right Sammy.' he pouted. Sam fetched him a cup of coffee which he accepted gratefully. 'Tell me it's wrong and that I shouldn't do it.'

'You're not giving me many clues here.' Sam said, to which Dean shook his head and sat up. 'I can't tell you because it's not something I'd do.'

'I'll support you whatever you do, you know that.'

Sam was pissed off that Dean refused to tell him. They'd been through so much shit together, how could he ever think anything Dean did was wrong, he had looked up to him since he was four years old. Looking at Dean he seemed distressed and agitated but Sam could peel that back and see that he was practically ecstatic, warmth radiating from him. Whatever he'd done he was pleased with himself. But he claimed that what he'd done was wrong.

'Just do what you want, it's not you'll listen to me anyway, but be careful that it doesn't bite you in the ass Dean.'

'It won't be my ass getting bitten.'

…

Castiel woke up to Dean's note; his phone number and another number that he said Cas should call if he didn't pick up the first one. He didn't say where he'd gone, just that they might not see each other for a few days and not to worry about him. Cas already knew he'd gone hunting and to ask him not to worry was plain stupid.

He was happy though, despite Dean's departure. He felt good.

It felt normal.

…

About ten minutes after Dean left the phone rang, interrupting Sam's shower. He ran downstairs with a towel on, hair leaving wet trails down his back and down the stairs, beginning to puddle at his feet as he stood still to answer the house phone.

'I'm calling about Castiel, is it okay if I come and visit you?'

'How's...' Sam quickly went through his appointments for the day in his head '...three?'

'Three is good, see you there.'

Gabriel was worried and he wanted proof that Castiel wasn't coping as well as he said he was. The kid had too many deaths put upon him of late and he needed to know how to help. He hadn't always been there in the ways he should have, getting Cas into trouble more often than getting him out of it and he wanted to make it up to him, make it all easy as possible and finally break it to him that Michael was dead and that he feared he would be next.


	5. Childhood memories mess with people

Dean stood awkwardly outside the room Cas had told him he'd be inside. With all the college kids buzzing around he felt so old all of a sudden. He pictured Sam in this environment, thinking about how he must have fit in so well amongst everyone else. He always was an interlocking puzzle piece though whilst Dean was more of a piece that had found its way into the wrong box and just kept getting in the way. He eyed up two girls that passed with arms linked and followed them with his gaze. He wished he'd gone to university. It made him think of a life he never had, what he could've grown to be. Hunting demons made him interesting though right? And it meant he got to meet Castiel Novak.

He had a quick look inside the lecture hall, eyeing up the filled seats, looking for Cas in the crowd of about two hundred. Who would have thought that so many people were interested in the stupid Romans and Greeks, although the way Castiel got all enthusiastic about the topic was endearing and they way he spoke about them could make even Dean interested, eyes all lit up and the corners of his mouth turning up. At times like that Dean would grab Cas and kiss him because he looked so happy. Times like that weren't so rare anymore. It didn't mean they weren't treasured though, every moment with Castiel was a gemstone and the vault was far from full.

He could hear the lecturers voice echoing in the room and seeping through the door, reeling off bits of information about Prometheus. Dean smirked, if only he'd actually met the guy he'd know that half of the things he was reeling off were bull. Prometheus made man from clay and then he gave them fire because he felt like he owed them for putting them on such a shitty planet. It was nothing to do with rebelling or wanting to be a hero; just shame for what he'd created. He'd have to tell Cas about that if he could ever work it into conversation.

They hadn't seen each other much. With Dean on a hunt that lasted longer than he thought and Castiel doing extra shifts at the restaurant where he worked they had barely had time to even sit down and have a proper conversation. Cas phoned him and asked how the hunt was going, and Dean didn't tell him about all the trouble he'd got himself in and how close his encounter got, so near that it terrified him. It had been happening of late more times than he'd like to admit and he knew Cas had something to do with it because frankly whenever they were apart he thought of nothing else. He loved the feeling as much as he despised it.

When they next saw each other Cas fussed over Dean's cuts and bruises and Dean told him it was just what came with the job and that he'd probably have to get used to him coming back too see him all beaten up. At that Cas tutted and said something about keeping safe in the field. It was nice to be fussed over though, Dean lingering in the moment as Cas made him take off his shirt and the brief sight of anguish on his face as he saw broken skin, watching him with a hint of smugness. That he got treated so well and other hunters didn't, Cas working on him so gently, his eyes a concentrated blue ocean that washed away his pain and took it far away to some place that didn't matter. It couldn't ever last. It was too good to be true. Maybe he had been taken by a Djinn a long time ago and this was what he really wanted, his dream. He'd wake up in some derelict warehouse and call out for Castiel, only to find out there had never been such a man on Earth. It saddened him to think so.

Odd how the things he didn't think he'd ever want would come to him in his best dreams and prove him wrong. Cas was one of those things, a part that grew inside him every day and made him a better person in turn. A piece that had always been missing but had never been missed.

The man inside the lecture hall had such a boring voice. He began to ask questions and he heard some dreary responses that they'd all been fed, a whole smart herd of cattle. Dean had no choice but to listen to everything going on inside until he heard the scrapes of people picking up their bags and snapping laptops shut followed by the brief mumbles and sighs of relief that grew closer as people filed out of the hall. He looked for the Cas, eyes scanning the stream of people, trying to pick him out from the crowd, finally locating the shorter, dark haired figure who was squashed between two girls and looked faintly uncomfortable as he was jostled about. Dean grabbed his wrist and pulled him aside, registering Cas squeak as a mysterious hand dragged him from his peers.

'Oh Dean, thank God.' Cas breathed, pressing himself close to Dean in the narrow corridor and realising that Dean was shying away from kissing him in such a public place. It wasn't fair. Dean couldn't just turn up at his school and expect Cas not to show him off a little, especially as he looked so damn irresistable that day; in a blue shirt with the top couple of buttons undone and sleeves rolled up muscular arms, light stubble and shadows around his eyes. He savored they days Dean looked like that. He hadn't seen him for a just under week after a 'quick and easy' hunt Dean had decided to go on last minute-he almost forgot just how good he could look.

'You look tired.' Castiel commented and Dean simply shrugged in reply, not able to find the words to tell Cas that he was up all night worrying because he had begun to find a guy so attractive that he wanted to scratch his eyeballs out in order to never feel that way again. It was just something about Cas. A tiny something that was wrong. It was enough to keep him going.

'Dean are you okay...it's just that you look sort of angry.'

Cas noticed Dean's face change into something softer and less violent. 'Fine, right, sorry...my mind's all over the place.' He finally embraced Cas, wrapping his arms around him and squeezing him tight, pressing a kiss to his forehead now that everyone had gone. He could feel Cas melting into him, the hard edges of his textbook digging into his stomach slightly.

'Anything I can do to help?' Cas mumbled into Dean's chest. Sometimes it was okay to be the shorter person of the two.

'Fuck me?' he said to himself internally.

'Come hunting with me this weekend...I missed you so much.' he said out loud.

Dean wondered if Castiel had a problem with eye contact or if he was just coy. If he did have a problem then it was a shame; more people should see his eyes. Though maybe he should keep them all to himself, his own little portal into Cas' mind, a personal stairway to heaven.

'Hunting what?' Cas stepped back from Dean's arms and looked at him intently, tilting his head as if it made him understand things with more clarity. They hadn't spoken about hunting since the first time it was mentioned; Cas thought that Dean had given up on ever persuading him to come but there he was, proposing it again. Dean could be persistant as hell.

'Wendigo.'

Dean shrugged. It was hardly going to be a dangerous trip- a bunch of other hunters were going to be there; Ellen, Jo, Bobby and Ash just to name a few. He wanted Cas to meet them all and it was his way of wiening him in. If Cas could successfully gank a Wendigo then he'd feel more confident in killing other things. If anything went wrong there was going to be people there to put it right. He would give Castiel a taste of power and control, something he evidently lacked. Besides he wanted Cas to see what he did for a living, not just to tell him stories, for him to watch and understand how and why people like him devoted their lives to hunting things and helping people.

'This weekend?' Cas paused 'I might be busy this weekend, y'know studying and stuff.'

'Aw come on Cas, you do enough studying...I'll make it worth your while, I promise.' Dean pouted.

Cas shrugged lightly 'I have to go pick up a book from the library that day.'

'I'll take you there now, you can get it early.' Dean grinned picking away at the loop holes in Castiel's weekend. He'd make sure Cas had such a good time if they went hunting, make him want to do it all the time. Hunting with someone like Cas would be different. They'd make vacations of it and visit all the tourist traps, go hiking and take pictures, do it all and kill some unholy sons of bitches while they were at it. A hunt-ation as opposed to a vacation.

'Dean.' Cas said quietly, a brief hint of warning in his voice at which Dean just smiled cockily. He loved it so much when Cas got all riled up. 'Fine you can take me but only because I don't like taking buses and I'm too tired to walk.'

Dean felt for the car keys in his pocket 'Okie dokie.'

He would have Cas agreeing by the end of the day if he had his own way.

...

'You'd love it so much though.' Dean said enthusiastically as Cas skimmed his eyes over book spines, occasionally getting out particular titles and flicking through them before putting them back with disdain. 'Can't seem to find it.' he muttered to himself.

'Cas.' Dean said sharply, interrupting his train of thought completely, bringing him back into the dusty library and the ailse were Dean leaned across a bookcase and he himself stood opposite with his back turned away as he looked for the dumb book his professor had recommended. He felt so tired at that moment what with his sleepless nights and Dean phoning him at odd times in the evening when he had other things to do, then waiting by the phone often until early morning until Dean had time away from the things he was doing at the time. The consequences of this  _thing_  he had going on with Dean were catching up with him and dragging him down by the ankles.

'Yes?'

'Please.'

Dean looked so full of hope and he carried with him that illusion. He was so lonely as of late. Cas was lonely too so why could they never be lonely together. The night before last he had been in a cheap motel, all gin stained sheets and static televisions and yet it didn't matter because he would be seeing Cas in a couple of days. It was like nothing mattered anymore and it made his head spin with how cliche it was. He sat with his phone in his hands and wrestled with his thoughts over whether to call him or not. It was so good to hear his voice, even if he did sound worried and overly anxious, but it made his head too foggy. He didn't phone that night, spurred on by the promise of it being better when he met Cas at his college and not having to remember how good looking he was only in his imagination. He needed the real thing, an actual being rather than a voice on the end of a phone. It made the time they spent together better, like they had more to hold on to when there was always the risk of them being torn apart by other commitments.

Although Cas could see the desperation in Dean's face he still couldn't go hunting with him. Not with the disposition he was trapped with. He wasn't ready, not yet. Never ready to face his fears. If he were to take on all the things that scared him then what would be left to keep him on edge?

'Cas...baby for me.' Dean picked up Cas' wrist and turned him around to face him, met with dull blue eyes that didn't suit the rest of his face. There was no passion left, not even a tiny spark. It made the words catch in Dean's throat and then the words tumbled out of Castiel's mouth before he could even begin to think about stopping them.

'For you.'

He signed himself up to another couple of years therapy as he was scooped up by Dean and hugged tenderly, warm lips whispering little sweet things into his neck. He shuddered with delight.

He couldn't help but smile because Dean Winchester was a wonderful, gorgeous addition to his life as well as the worst decision he had ever made. He would be the creation of him and the death of him as his warm hands skimmed his hips and cradled the small of his back. The epitome of indecency inside the hushed library as Dean whispered for Cas to stay quiet.

'I promise I won't let anything happen to you.' Dean mumbled into Cas' neck, who braced himself against the bookcase, hands gripping the shelves to stop his from sliding down, Dean's hands squeezing his own.

One day he would refuse, finally find the courage to say no to Dean. But how could he say no to the man he felt was doing him a favour by even being seen around with him and speaking to him, like it was an honor to be seen the way Dean saw him. He felt that he didn't really deserve any of it. Guys like Dean don't even look at guys like Cas. Castiel had become accustomed to loneliness and now he wasn't lonely at all...it made no sense to him what Dean saw.

…

'You ready for this?' Dean asked, eyeing up Cas in the passenger seat as he stared absent mindedly out of the window, the scenery passing him in a blur before he could capture any of it. It was raining and he watched grey clouds roll out for them, a welcoming party to what looked to be a dismal morning. Cas put his forehead against the cool glass, seeing himself as he did so in the foreground, and then seeing Dean behind him, sneaking glances every so often.

He promised to himself to remember the moments like this when it all seemed so good. Sam had advised him to start writing about his days; how he felt, what the weather was like, the people he was with. Tonight he would write that he was scared but it didn't matter because Dean could make him want to be brave if he tried hard enough for him. He would write that the sky was composed of black and grey strands of thread and that he hoped the sunshine would never come out because he liked the way that dark shadows played. He might write that Dean was perfect but he liked to keep things like that in his head, all for himself and for no one else.

He smiled at his reflection. 'As I'll ever be.'

They sat in silence, peaceful but aware of the omnipresent feeling of doubt that clung to their skin like wet clothes. One hand reached out to another, met in the middle and remaining there as neither could feel the need to let go. Their was dirt underneath Dean's fingernails and it was the little things like that that mattered.

'I'll keep you safe out there, I promise.' Dean urged, digging his fingers into the steering wheel with the hand that didn't lay occupied. 'Won't let anything touch you.'

'You're always promising things to me.' Cas sighed in content. He was uncomfortable, nauseous, and the Impala smelt like gasoline and made him feel misty and yet he'd never been happier. It was wonderful and Dean was beautiful, his face shadowed by the clouds despite his green eyes managing to pierce the veil of a bleak horizon. It didn't matter, he could lie to Castiel a thousand times and he'd still be smitten and cling onto his every word. Dean would promise the ocean and give Cas a shell instead, and it would mean more than the whole sea and all the creatures it held.

* * *

'So how is Cas?' Gabriel asked, eyeing up the man that sat opposite him, watching as he inadvertently smoothed his hair down and tucked one side behind his ears then got up and went to his desk to go fetch his notes on Castiel Novak.

He finally understood why Cas went to therapy so often.

'Bad hair day?' he sympathised. His hair looked great though, he couldn't think of it ever not looking good with the way it flopped forward on his face but curled slightly away, casting shadows on his cheeks. Hair that long had to be a such a hassle, but so fun to run fingers through. Something to hold on to if needs be. Gabriel glanced awkwardly to the side as if Sam could read his thoughts.

Sam nodded and went back to searching, locating one of many little black books and bringing it back to sit opposite Gabriel who he noticed had a some what spaced out expression on his face.

'You are aware that my brother seems to be leading yours astray?' Sam laughed quietly. He was upset at first, angry that Dean had chosen to take such a risk in taking Cas hunting. He had been his patient for just over two months now and he felt he'd got to know Cas- enough to know that he wouldn't be ready or prepared if anything did happen.

Looking across at Gabriel he saw little similarity in the two men; different eye colour and hair, but there was an indisputable hint of something that both seemed to possess, a mischievous glint in their eyes and the ability to charm the pants off somebody if necessary. There was no denying that good looks ran in the family but in Sam's eyes Gabriel did have the edge. He believed it to be the soft hair that curled around at the front and flicked out a the back, or the sunlight-shooting-through-a-glass-of-whiskey eyes that bored into him with a passion that Castiel didn't possess unless the right topics were brought up.

'How do you know it's not mine leading yours?' Gabriel shrugged, watching as Sam considered the notion in his head and discarded it, giving him a look of 'don't be an idiot'. He was good at giving that look. 'In all seriousness though, is he okay? I don't want to break it to him if it's just going to make him...well not  _him_.'

The concern Gabriel had was sweet, but he had to face that the news of Michael's departure could set them right back to square one. Then to put the fear that Gabriel could be a possible demon candidate...it would break his heart.

'He's okay, doing better and it's probably going to sound mad, me being his therapist and all, but I think Dean is helping him get better in more ways than I ever could.' Sam shrugged. Dean hadn't specifically told him anything about the things he and Cas did but he imagined that they were a lot closer than they let on. It frustrated him briefly to know that Dean didn't tell him these things. If anything was going on with his brother and Castiel then he'd gently discourage it but he knew of the positive effects they'd have on each other.

* * *

 

'What if they don't like me Dean?'

'They'll love you, trust me.'

They stood at the trunk, one of the two shivering despite being dressed in a winter coat and a scarf. He wasn't used to travelling from a warm place to a dramatically colder one in the space of a few hours. His body wasn't well adjusted to the harsher climate and it showed, his cheeks rosy. He presumed that Dean had weather worn skin that could brave any climate, a trophy earned from years of things like this. Even Dean could feel a chill running along his bones though.

Cas watched as Dean loaded a shotgun and winced slightly when he handed it to him, a small piece of power in his very own hands. It didn't make him feel brave or strong though like it was supposed to, just like a kid playing with daddy's gun while he was out at work. He didn't even know how to aim the thing. He would go to a shooting range one day and learn how to handle guns, impress Dean with what he could do if he put his mind to it. He guessed he should probably start working out or something and learn how to take and throw a punch. If not for hunting then it was a useful skill to possess in every day life. No more hiding.

'Just in case.' Dean stated, putting a reassuring hand on his shoulder and Cas stared at the shotguns body in his grasp, cold and shiny. He was silently panicking and Dean could sense it, pulling him in by the hand for a warm embrace, feeling his stiff body relax a fraction in his arms. 'I can't force you to do this Cas.'

'I want to.' Cas replied firmly, pulling himself away from Dean as the others began to turn up. 'You never know, if i'm any good I could do this for a living.'

* * *

 

'Well we hunt demons for a living.'

'You're a psychiatrist.' Gabriel smirked, tilting his head as if to say carry on.

'Well I used to, not anymore. Dean still does though and plenty of others too.'

Sam wondered why he was telling Gabriel any of this, although he knew it was because he had the same hopeful expression as Cas did and it was a look that could make the most stubborn of men give up their deepest, darkest secrets. The way they both had a habit of looking up at people under their eyelashes with desperate, needy eyes.

It wasn't anybody's business what they did but the remaining residents of the Novak family didn't seem to be just 'anybody's'. Normal folk tended to panic but the Novak's had a habit of taking things in their stride. No wonder Dean had taken such a shine to Castiel. 'Dean's taken Cas on a hunt today.'

'Where?' Gabriel asked curiously. 'Could be dangerous.'

* * *

 

'Man, I love these forest hunts, remind me of the good old days.' Ash yawned, hopping out of his car and stretching, making his way over to Cas and Dean to evaluate the situation. 'I heard there was fresh meat coming with us today.' he said, sticking out his hand for Cas to shake. 'I'm Ash.'

He opened up his trunk and got out his laptop. 'I have recordings of three out there today, I'm tracking them back to a cave just off from the falls.'

Castiel looked across at the fall, raging water from all the rain. It was no wonder that so many people camped out in those woods as they got to wake up the the sound of rushing water and bird song. Nobody would ever suspect that they'd get taken by a Wendigo in such a nice setting. There wouldn't be anybody camping recently though, not with all the 'bear' attacks and disappearances, that and the climate, cold enough to produce frosty breaths and dust the ground with a fine powder. There was a stark difference between autumn back where Cas lived.

'Is Garth showing up?' Dean asked Ash, pulling him in for a quick one armed hug which Ash reciprocated just as warmly. Cas felt like he was going to be in the way. An asset more than anything. It was cold and damp. He pulled his coat around him tighter, feeling the cold metal of the protection charm Dean had told him he had to wear against his skin. He had a pocket full of reasons why he should be there and another full of reasons he shouldn't. He knew he was going to have to snap out of his timid nature sooner or later, but forests were scary, terrifying even.

'Not likely, he was pretty beat up after the last one he did, but chances are he'll be up and out sooner than we all think he will.' he turned to Cas 'So what made you want to become a hunter?'

Cas opened his mouth to say something but was interrupted by Dean saying that Jo and Ellen had arrived.

* * *

 

'He actually agreed to that?' Gabriel shook his head. 'He wouldn't.'

Sam shrugged 'Well apparently he did, Dean's convinced that Castiel has something to do with the supernatural.'

'My parents thought the same, but got him tested by out local priest and nothing out of the ordinary arose.'

'I don't think it works like that.' The room was hot. 'Do you mind if I take this off?' He asked Gabriel ,not waiting for a reply as he took of his blazer and loosened his tie from around his neck. Gabriel looked away, almost embarrassed. He usually got to know people a bit more before clothes began to come off.

It was Autumn and not very warm at all, cold enough to need a sweater on around the house and a coat on when he went out. Autumn was Gabriel's favourite time of the year, bonfires and hot chocolate, snuggly clothes and having an excuse to snuggle up with someone. When that side of the world decided summer had gone on for far too long and it began to rain leaves, the atmosphere tensing for winters arrival and basking in the glory of orange, crispy months. Woodland walks and darkened nights. Castiel prefered spring, and Dean liked summer if he could get the time off.

'Anyway, forests and Cas are a big no.' Gabriel stated, leaning forward in his seat 'He's terrified of them.'

Sam sat up. It was all so interesting in the Novak family, all death and mistrust, fear and loathing, heavy bitter hate and curious sparks of passion, hope and light. They were a phenomenon and their own little web of strange happening. Castiel was afraid of forests. 'How so?'

'He must have been about fourteen when it happened.' Gabriel paused, looking wistful 'He came home in tears but he wouldn't tell anybody why.'

* * *

 

Dean pushed a palm over Cas' chest, stopping him in his tracks and making him jump. 'Look.' he whispered pointing to a spot between the trees, Cas straining to see what he was indicating at. All he could see was a green and brown mess of trees that made him feel faintly uncomfortable. The past was the past and it was laughing at him, biting at his ankles and clawing at his head.

'I don't see anything.' he replied quietly, acutely aware of Dean's hand where his heart should be. He could feel how fast it was beating and Dean could too, casting it off as adrenaline. It was deafening inside the silence they stood upon.

'No wonder, you're not wearing your glasses.'

Dean looked at Cas affectionately, trying to remember what it was that got him into this mess. Castiel was such a beautiful mess and it pained him to think about any of it. Dean fell involuntarily, tripping when Castiel blushed, stumbling when he smiled and hitting the ground when he decided that dean was worthy of any affection. He had pondered the thought before and no, Dean wasn't gay, he was just falling for Cas and Cas alone. There had never been anyone like him and there would never be another the same. Lay them down they were going to fall in love sooner or later presuming that nothing would ever go wrong. It was beautifully depressing, the thing that they had going on. The prospect of Castiel being attacked at any moment. Dean couldn't always be there to see him through the day without any sign of any supernatural occurences. One day his angel could be there and the next...not there at all.

'I'm wearing contacts.'

'Look straight ahead, you'll see them when they move.'

'Oh!'

Castiel could see them. A group of deer pushing softly away at the undergrowth, their velvet muzzles foraging the damp earth. They were so pretty, a moment Castiel and Dean both knew to savour before they skipped away at the sound of a stray foreign noise. Dean put an arm around Cas, a hand on his hip to pull them together, resting his head slightly on Castiel's. Cas sighed into him, content with watching them all morning and forgetting all about stupid Wendigo. Stupid everything. He stared at them, everything about them elegant from their curved backs to sleek legs, dainty hooves and soft untrusting eyes. He didn't know if he saw the antlers of a stag or just the wizened branches of a tree in the distance. He thought about seeing this in the spring time where the coats would be shed and the flowers present.

Someone, either Cas or Dean stepped on a twig, breaking it and sending the deer in different directions, releasing the breaths that they didn't know they were holding and making them remember what they were actually meant to be doing.

'I have a tattoo.' Cas said, breaking the silence they shared. 'It's a deer, that just reminded me I suppose.'

'You? Of all people.' Dean shook his head, trying not to laugh. He just couldn't picture Cas in some shady tattoo parlour, gritting his teeth as a needle touched his skin. 'Can I see?'

Cas was an unexplored area for him...they hadn't ever gone further than just kissing, and although that could get passionate, there hadn't yet been the need for them to go any further. One day he would know every crevice of that body, every bit of marked skin and all the places in between. Castiel would be his own and he would claim that body for himself.

Castiel pushed aside his coat and peeled up his sweater to reveal previously unmarked skin, painted with the fist-sized image of a stag standing proud down the side of his body in black and grey. It was nice but Dean felt it was out of place on a body that should remain free of anything, like the thing didn't even deserve a spot on Castiel's torso.

Cas knew all about Dean's tattoo, listening intently one evening as they sat on the couch, peaceful as he told him it was to do with protection, wincing when he said that he might have to get one if he was serious about all this stuff. He wasn't going to tell him about it originally but his shirt had come off during a heated session and he hated to see the look of questioning on Cas' face. Cas had touched it and it made him shiver.

Cas blushed and put himself back together. 'I was drunk and I think I got dared to go into the shop, the woman said I had doe eyes and so I told her to do a stag or something.'

'You're a mystery Cas.' Dean had time to say before Ellen shouted for them to come over and stop messing around. Cas was not prepared for this. He was haunted.

* * *

 

'Of course he came to me some time later because he's not the type who can keep things to himself...he said that something chased him in the woods...dogs I recall.'

**_Castiel lifted his head at the sound of panting, standing still to listen clearly as he could. It was too faint for him to hear definitely but there was the brief slaps of paw on hard ground and a heat in the air that wasn't there before. He didn't particularly like dogs but he could stand them if they were to run past him, he'd just have to brace himself on a tree so he didn't get knocked over. It was probably just someone hunting deer, bringing a couple of hounds to keep them company. Unless it was wolves...there hadn't ever been any wolf sightings in his area but maybe they'd relocated and now they were hungry and looking for a child shaped snack. He glanced sharply around the forest, lines of green the only thing in his vision as he turned his head to scope the area. He could feel his heartbeat._ **

'Plain old dogs?' Sam asked, pulling a face briefly.

'No.'

**_The noise was getting closer, ragged breaths that promised to be followed by sharp teeth and deep claws. Normal dogs didn't sound like that. He stood, fixed in position like a lifeless marble statue, panicking as his feet refused to move, the floor wet cement that was hardening around his ankles. Move, he told himself; run away, climb a tree, anything except just standing there as easy prey, but his feet and head showed objections to communicating and he became stone. He couldn't see but he could hear it so clearly, the way they snarled and the saliva the spewed. It was that imagery that eventually forced his legs to work and his mind to stop thinking, adrenaline taking over and pushing him onward. He could feel the strokes of fear inside his veins, coming in random surges throughout his body and making him carry on. His legs ached from running and his feet were sore from the dry hard ground but he did not stop as the noises still chased after him, far too close for comfort having caught a scent. These were not normal dogs. These were unkempt, wild, savage beings and the thing that frightened Cas the most was the strange fact that although their sound was omnipresent, they were nowhere to be seen. They snapped at his ankles, making Cas stumble and reach out for branches that weren't there, leaving bloody stretches along his skin, a deep red absorbed through his jeans. He could smell them, a rot of burning and rust and general unpleasantness that made him want to throw up. Running against the cold wind, snot mixed with tears streamed down his face, marring his vision temporarily until he wiped a hurried sleeve across his face. He felt a cold tooth scrape along the back of his arm, lurching forward before any jaws had chace to snap shut. He ran until he was certain his feet were bloody and bruised, and they ran until he found his way out of the tangled forest. He continued to run, feeling no fear of the confused stares he got, only a choked up emotion that he couldn't properly convey._ **

'He couldn't see them?' Sam asked, leaning forward. His mind was going a mile a minute.

'That's what he said...that they were there but they weren't. Of course I thought he was off his face, found some mushrooms in the forest and had a bad trip.' Gabriel smiled 'But he had scratches along his legs just like he described and I had no choice...'

'Hell hounds.'

'Pardon?'

'He was most likely chased in the forest by hell hounds.' Sam said simply. In his time he had began to learn that sometimes it was better to just spit out news instead of sugar coating it.

'Castiel was chased by satanic dogs?'

'Hell hounds.' Sam repeated. 'If it makes you feel any better, if they wanted to kill him they would have. A boy can't outrun one of those things. Chances are they were sent to scare him, not actually harm him.'

'Our family's so screwed up.' Gabriel sighed, briefly putting his head in his hands. 'Cas hasn't been in a forest since.'

* * *

 

'Shit.' Cas whispered to himself repeatedly. 'Shit. Shit. Shit. Shit.'

He had somehow broken off from the group, finding himself alone when the bigger group of hunters split into smaller ones to survey the area and attack from all angles. Although always subtly watching, Dean had lost track of him, Castiel submerging himself fully into his surroundings. Dean didn't allow himself to worry though.

Castiel picked his pace up along the forest, seeing a brief yellow eye here and a whitened claw there. He would remind himself that it was just his eyes playing dirty tricks on him and his mind reconstructing memories that should stay as crumbled rubble.

He found a log to sit on and put his head in his hands, exhaling and inhaling as deep as he could manage, trying to make sense of the situation he had put himself in. if he stayed there maybe someone would trudge by and find him, pick him up and dust him off and present him to the others with rolled eyes and comments of 'sorry but I really don't think you're cut out for this business'.

Where was Dean? What happened to not letting anything happen?

Castiel's mouth was dry and his eyes watered. He would not let a childhood fear get the better of him. He was so much bigger than that. Don't let the monsters in, lock the doors and bolt them.

He let himself sit for a while, pushing dirt with his feet. He wasn't cut out for this. He wondered if Dean was worrying about him, fearing that he'd got himself taken by a Wendigo when in reality he was sat cold on a piece of old tree. Dean already must have had pretty low expectations for Castiel, but they must have been dashed now.

Then that sound, nestled among a simple bird song. Deep and angry beneath a shrill three noted call that came from a beak.

That haunting, childhood sound that made his stomach lurch.

A groan that unlocked the door and let his demons out.

The memories came flooding back to him, clouding his vision as he sprang up clumsily, completely consumed by his mind, stumbling into thick tree trunks and reaching for anything that could push him forward. He was too deep in the forest. They would find him again and this time they wanted his blood upon their teeth and flesh in their stomachs. He cursed the dead leaves that carpeted the floor, resistant against his jerked movement. He couldn't move fast enough. The hounds were upon him.

Dean was a liar and Castiel would die for his lies.

He surged forward as fast as he could, never fast enough as he heard the growls and sharp snorts behind him, sprinting toward him at an unnatural speed. If he could just get back to the Impala...

Cas hit the ground as his foot caught a protruding rock, leaving him more vulnerable than ever as he lay sprawled on the ground, tucking his body close into him, making himself small as possible. Scraped up knees and a dirty face that would be cleaned with the purity of emotion.

It was more than fear this time.

It was the feeling of death; despair.

Dean called out for Castiel in the forest.

He did not receive a response.

He instead found a defeated man in a cold wood. He heard the sobs that racked through the body and something caught in Dean's throat, an objection to an image he would never be able to forget; truly broken Cas. His Castiel, lying damaged on the floor with his knees tucked under, shallow breaths coming from his body. The area around him was devoid of any foliage, a perfect set of disproportional wings made of plain dirt Castiel's blanket. He had managed to make it look like all leaves had scurried away from his huddled form in fear, now he lay in an unconventional crop circle.

'Cas?' Oh God Cas, answer me baby.'

He knelt next to the crumpled body that was laid down oddly on the floor, grabbing his hands and pulling them away from his face, greeting with huge scared blue eyes, outlined red and full of something horrible. It was a look Dean would remember forever. And this was all his fault. He had promised he'd protect Cas and there he was, cold and stiff on a bare floor. He had failed.

'Cas.' he whispered. 'Cas I never should have done this.'

Castiel made a small noise. 'Dean.'

Cas looked up at him, his cheeks red and tear stained and his eyes swimming in water. He let out a choked sob 'They were coming for me.'

Then he picked himself up to sit on his knees and he cried into the front of dean's shirt, bunching the fabric with his numb hands as Dean apologised over and over, trying to soothe Cas by gently rocking him back and forth. He could feel Cas shivering beneath his arms and could feel as new waves of tears washed through him. He rested his forehead on Cas', staring into those eyes of deep water.

'Who was coming Cas?'

'Hounds.'

'But there's nothing here baby...'

Castiel lifted his head from Dean's, glancing around with quick eyes and vigilance to find no trace of anything. 'They were tearing me apart.' he whispered, pulling at his clothes, lifting his shirt to find his usual clear skin instead of the gouged mess that had been there minutes before. No ripped flesh, no bitten skin. 'I was bleeding...I was d-dying.' he shivered. 'Dean I swear.'

'It's okay Cas, it's all okay now.' Dean soothed, rubbing Cas's arms and trying to warm him up. He let it pass over his mind that Cas had been hallucinating. That wasn't important yet.

'It was so real...' Cas trailed off, a distant look forming on his face. He put his forehead back to Dean's, pulling his collar and softly putting his iced hands on Dean's neck who didn't flinch with the cold contact.

'I've gone crazy again.' he smiled to himself then smiled apologetically at Dean. 'You don't want me in your life Dean, as long as I'm like this I don't deserve you. You don't need this.'

Dean pulled back a fraction. 'Cas...' He shook his head 'Let me make this better, how do I make this all better Cas?'

'I don't want to look at you, you look sad.' Cas stated simply.

'Of course I look sad, Christ Cas, just let me get you back to the car...I'm gonna make it better okay?'

Cas shrugged 'Why even try?'

Dean grabbed Castiel's hand and brought it to his lips, kissing his knuckles. 'Because I've never felt this way about anybody before and you are not crazy.'

He stood up, pulling Cas up with him. Castiel still couldn't look at him.

Dean leaned on the side of the Impala, watching from the corner of his eye as Cas sat huddled around a cup of coffee. He silently thanked himself for remembering to put the flask in there earlier that morning. Cas sat on the side of the seat, facing out towards the forest with unblinking eyes. Dean wondered what he could possibly be looking at. He wanted to open a door into Cas' mind and have a rummage around, pull out all the things that haunted him and leave him with nothing but good.

'Cas can you please just look at me?' Dean pleaded. It had been an hour. Cas shook his head, lowering his gaze as Dean bent down to meet him at eye level. 'Please look at me.' Dean repeated quietly. He prised one hand away from the cup Castiel was holding and held it, pleasantly warm from the hot coffee.

Cas slowly met his eyes, looking at him from under his eyelashes.

Dean sighed, feeling like a tiny bit of the weight on his shoulders had been removed. He kissed Castiel on the lips lightly, tilting his chin up with his finger.

'I'm sorry Dean, I can't help it.'

Dean wanted to put his head in his hands and cry. Cas was his little warrior, fighting constant battles with himself and soldiering on. But it seemed his warrior had lost his morale. Why could they not live a simple love story where they met within different circumstances and everything was rose covered. Why did it all have to be so damn difficult? He consoled himself with the thought that it was better to have met this Castiel rather than to never have met him at all. Stupid cute college students who had pretty blue eyes and studied Latin. Bane of his life. Best thing in his life.

'It doesn't matter.'

Castiel shook his head, a sour expression cast upon his face. 'But of course it matters, how can you be with someone like this.' he looked down at himself in disgust. He felt like everything he did made him depreciate in value. He was becoming more worthless every day. He didn't want to guess at what would happen when he hit zero and had to lower himself into the negative spectrum.

'You're worth everything Cas, you could be ten times worse and I would still love you as much as I do today, as much as I have and as much as I will.'

'Y-you think you love me?' Cas whispered, tilting his head. 'You don't, you can't.'

'I think...you just have this effect on m-' he was cut short as Cas cast aside his coffee cup and kissed him warmly, wrapping his arms tightly around Dean's neck and holding him. Cas pulled himself away from Dean's mouth, arms still linked around him, and Dean's arms wrapped around his waist. 'Nobody has ever told me that they loved me.'

'You're lovable Cas.' Dean shrugged.

'One day you'll die of disillusionment.'

One day Dean would die of disenchantment.

* * *

**Sorry for the rather confusing layout of this. I aimed to make it so the conversations between Cas and Dean would run parallel to Sam and Gabriels (Not sure how well that translated)**

**Sorry for how long it takes me to update chapters, but what with school i can usually only write for about half an hour every night.**

**Thank you!**


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